
Class __£i_/21. 
Book 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT 



CambriDge l^tetorical ^eriejs 

EDITED BY G. W. PROTHERO, LiTT.D. 

FELLOW OF king's COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE 
AND PROFESSOR OF HISTORY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH 



THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 



mr- 



s- 



J^J><Jj^ 



THE 



UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 

1765— 1865 



BY 



EDWARD CHANNING, Ph.D. 

ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF HISTORY IN HARVARD UNIVERSITY 



OIJ'O 



^ 



t'U 



MACMILLAN AND CO. 

LONDON; MACMILLAN & CO., LTD. 
1896 

All rights reserved 



Copyright, 1896, 
By MACMILLAN AND CO. 



5n^ 



Nnrfaooti ^rtss 

J. S. Gushing & Co. — Berwick & Smith. 
Norwood Mass. U.S.A. 



EDITOR'S PREFACE. 

The aim of this series is to sketch the history of Modern 
Europe, with that of its chief colonies and conquests, from about 
the end of the fifteenth century down to the present ti?ne. In 
one or two cases the story will commence at an earlier date, but 
this will only be by way of introduction. In the case of the 
col nies it will naturally begin later. The histories of the differ- 
-n. countries will be described, as a general rule, in separate 
' imes,for it is believed that, except in epochs like that of the 
'ich Revolution and Napoleon, the connection of events will 
I iter understood and the continuity of historical development 
clearly displayed by this method, than by any other, 
'le series is intended for the use of all persons anxious to 
understand the nature of existing political conditions. "The 
roots of the present lie deep in the past^'' and the real significance 
of contemporary eve7its cannot be grasped unless the historical 
causes which have led to them are known. The plan of the 
series will make it possible to treat the history of the last four 
ceiituries in considerable detail, and to embody the most impor- 
tant results of modern research. It is hoped therefore that the 
fo7'thcoming volutnes will be useful not only to beginners but to 
students who have already acquired some getiej-al knowledge of 



vi Editor s Preface. 

European History. For those who wish to carry their studies 
further, the bibliography appended to each volume will act as a 
guide to original sources of information and works tnore detailed 
and authoritative. 

Considerable attention will be paid to geography, and each 
volume will be furnished with such maps and plans as may be 
requisite for the illustratioti of the text. 



PREFATORY NOTE. 

The aim of this little book is to trace the steps by which 
the American people and its peculiar type of federal state 
have developed out of such heterogeneous and unpromising 
materials for nation-building as were to be found in the 
English-American Colonies in 1760. Less attention has been 
given to campaigns and battles than is usual in works of this 
class, and the space thus gained has been devoted to the 
elucidation of the deeper causes underlying the American 
Revolution, and to a detailed account of the period between 
the close of the Revolutionary War and the inauguration of 
President Madison. 

The Bibliographical Note at the end of the volume is 
intended to be of service to those who desire to make a further 
study of American History, and not necessarily to indicate the 
sources of information on which the text is founded. The first 
six chapters are in fact based on the author's own reading of 
the original sources. For Chapter VI, however, considerable 
assistance was derived from Henry Adams's History of the 
United States (1800 — 1817), and the first part of Chapter VH 
was drawn mainly from that masterly work. For the remaining 
portion of Chapter VH, and for Chapter VHI, the biographies 
and collected writings and speeches of the leading men of that 
time were perused. Chapter IX is founded mainly on James 
Ford Rhodes's two volumes on the period from 1850 — 1860. 
The author has also read the more important biographies and 
collections of speeches dealing with that epoch \ but his prin- 



viii Prefatory Note. 

cipal reliance was on Mr. Rhodes's excellent work. It is to be 
regretted that the present book was in type before the publica- 
tion of Mr. Rhodes's third volume, covering the critical years 
i860 — 1862. For Chapter X the official records and the com- 
prehensive works have been used — especially Colonel Dodge's 
stimulating Bird's- Eye View of the Civil War. John C. 
Ropes's careful study of the early campaigns {The Story of the 
Civil War, Vol. I) was published too late to be of assistance 
in the preparation of this account. Mr. Ropes, however, has 
kindly read the proofs of this chapter — a service Dr. Justin 
Winsor graciously performed for the earlier chapters. For 
their many valuable suggestions the author's thanks are due, as 
they are also to Professor Prothero, who has laid him under 
deep obligation. Above all he desires to express his sense of 
the kindness of his friend and colleague Professor Albert Bush- 
nell Hart, who has read the proofs of the entire work. Perhaps 
it is needless to add that none of these authors and kind friends 
is to be held in any way responsible for any errors, whether of 
fact or of opinion, which may be found within these covers. 

The maps were compiled by the author to illustrate this 
volume, and it is hoped that they will be found useful. It is 
practically impossible to be absolutely accurate in a work of 
this size, covering such an extended period and deahng with so 
many disputed events. It is sometimes impossible for an 
American to appreciate the motives of his " kin beyond sea " ; 
and it is not always easy for him to do justice to his own 
countrymen. The utmost that an historical student can do is 
to study and write without mahce in his heart — and this the 
present writer can fairly claim to have done. He will cordially 
welcome the discovery and communication of any error. 

EDWARD CHANNING. 

Cambridge, Massachusetts, 
October, 1895. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I. The Colonists, 1 760-1 765 i 

II. Constitutional Opposition, 1 760-1 774 ..... 41 

III. Revolution .......... 72 

IV. The Constitution ......... 107 

V. The New Nation . . . . . . . . -135 

VI. Supremacy of the Jeffersonian Republicans, 1801-1809 • 160 
VII. The Second War of Independence and the Era of Good 

FeeHng 184 ■ 

VIII. Democracy .......... 208 

IX. The Extension of Slavery, 1849-1861 ..... 235 

X. The War for the Union, 1861-1865 258 



APPENDICES. 

I. The Virginia Resolves, 1769 . 

II. The Declaration of Independence 

III. The Articles of Confederation 

IV. The Constitution of the United States 
V. Bibliographical Note 



301 
302 
307 
31S 
336 



MAPS. 



I. To illustrate Chapters I — IV 
II. To illustrate Chapters V— IX 
III. To illustrate Chapter X 



at the beginning 
page 135 
at the end 



MAP I . TO ILLTJJ 




New 
dvania, 



,ji whose 
^he line 



? York 
nission 



LongiiuRe. 85° W. Gr&en 



Scale of Englisli Mile 



CccrrLbrid* 



THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 

1765—1865. 

CHAPTER I. 

THE COLONISTS, I76O-65. 

The colonists numbered in 1760 about sixteen hundred 
thousand souls, whites and negroes, slaves and freemen, 
foreigners and native born. They are always described as 
English Americans; and, as a matter of fact, the English 
race was the predominant element. But nearly all the more 
important branches of the Germanic and Keltic races were 
represented among them. There were no Slavs, however, and 
thus, as Mr Henry Cabot Lodge has pointed out, the whites, 
although representing many nationalities, belonged to the two 
branches of the Aryan stock which have always shown great 
powers of amalgamation. The several elements which made 
up this population were so intermingled that some care is 
needed to separate them. 

In New England and in the eastern and older settled 
portion of Virginia the whites were of pure ^j^^ ^^^ 
English extraction — that is to say, their ancestors England 

,, . , , ■ r r- ^ Colonists. 

all came from the southern portion 01 Great 

C. A. I 



MAI- I . TO ILLUSTRATE CHAPTERS IIV. 




NOTES TO MAP I. 

The Proclamation of 1763 (see pp. 27, 103, 108, 109, 117). 
li' m' n'. Northern limit of East Florida. 
0' f ' g:' h' p'. Boundaries of West Florida. The territory included within 

the lines f b 0' g' was added to West Florida in 1764. 
e'n'. "Lands lying between the rivers Altamaha and St Maria's" were 

annexed to Georgia. 
M' a' m. Lands west of this line reserved for the use of the Indians • the 

words of the Proclamation are : " Lands beyond the heads or sources 

of any of the rivers which fall into the Atlantic Ocean from the west or 

north-west. 
f h g b 0. Southern boundary of the Province of Quebec. 

The Quebec Act, 1774 (pp. 66—67). 
1 1. Southern limit of territory added to the Province of Quebec " pro- 
vided aJways, That nothing herein contained relating to the boundary 
of the Province of Quebec, shall in any wise affect the boundaries of 
an J other colony. 

Treaty of 1783 (p. loj). 
athg'b. Northern limit of United States. 
b e 1. Eastern limit of United States. 

The line from b to 1 was in dispute from ,783—1842, g e is the line as 
finally determined In 1842 (p. 224). 4 . 6 o is me line as 

a d k b p t u w X b' f '. Western limit of United States. 
^ p. nyf. ' ^''""'^"' ""^' "' ^"""^ ^"'''- ^''P"'^<^ ^y Spain (see 
Claims and Cessions, 1776— 1801 (pp. 108— no, 112). 
h ^' '^°'''j"=™ boi'ndary of Massachusetts according to the charters 

i:ZT' ''^'""" Massachusetts and Conicticut unde" their 
P q. Southern boundary of Connecticut according to her charter 

vl- ^'"'^"^!""='' '" '^' ''"'^ ""'■"^ °f 'his line and west of PennsvL I 
Sc'cut"""^^"'' ^'"""'' ^^ Massachusetts, New York?7nd | 
W 2. Boundary between the Carolinas. 
X d _. Southern boundary of South Carolina. 

Mason and Dixon Line (p. 4) 

separating the llave^an^ frTst'at'^n'X'yrL'; iTlt"^ '"^ ""' 
Vermont. 



t'nii/t^ /'nnrrjiA Awm. 



2 The Colonists, 1760-65. [Chap. 

Britain. The people of Connecticut probably held in their 
veins the purest English blood of any single group of colonists. 
In Massachusetts there was a slight mixture of Scottish blood, 
introduced by the prisoners deported by Cromwell after the 
victories of Dunbar and Worcester. There was also a small 
French element in the population of the Bay Colony. This 
comprised the descendants of the Huguenot refugees, who 
fled from France after the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes. 
Few in point of numbers, they were still of considerable im- 
portance. Peter Faneuil and James Bowdoin, of this stock, 
were among the most eminent Massachusetts men of their 
times. In Rhode Island, the Huguenot descendants formed 
a larger proportion of the population ; but, considered numer- 
ically, they were insignificant. There were also a few Portu- 
guese Jews living at Newport. With these exceptions, the 
New Englanders were of pure EngUsh blood — descended for 
the most part from the people of the eastern counties. There- 
fore, they in all strictness may be termed English. 

The earlier settlers of the tide-water portion of Virginia — 
the section containing the large tobacco plan- 
c^onistT*^^'^" tations — were likewise of pure English extrac- 
tion. The later comers to the Shenandoah 
Valley and to the slopes of the Blue Ridge were English 
and Scotch-Irish Presbyterians. Intermingled with them 
was a strong body of German Protestants who had reached 
that country through Pennsylvania. This combined Scotch- 
Irish and German folk penetrated farther south and west 
along the foot-hills of the Appalachian Mountains. They 
formed the bulk of the settlers in the "upper regions" of the 
Carolinas. This racial element in the interior of the Southern 
Colonies — entirely unlike the older settlers on the seaboard in 
blood, religion, and institutions — was a factor of importance 
in the history of the South. A strong, God-fearing race, it 
produced two of the most remarkable figures in the annals of 



I.] Soiithern and Middle Colonies. 3 

America — Andrew Jackson and John C. Calhoun. Unlike 
the inhabitants of tide-water Virginia, the dwellers in the low- 
lands of the Carolinas and Georgia were largely of non-English 
blood. The Huguenots were especially strong in South Caro- 
lina, and among them were some of the most prosperous and 
public-spirited families of the colony. The South German 
Protestants, or Salzburgers as they were termed, formed an 
important portion of the inhabitants of Georgia. Scattered 
here and there throughout the Carolinas and Georgia were 
groups of Scots who had migrated thither after the final over- 
throw of the Stuart cause at CuUoden and the subsequent 
breaking down of the clan system by the English government. 
Among them were Flora MacDonald, the saviour of Prince 
Charles, and her husband, who was a man of some influence 
among his neighbours. The recent immigrants from Scotland, 
some of whom had done their best to overthrow the Hano- 
verian dynasty in 1745, remained true to George the Third in 
1776. A few returned to Scotland and others enlisted in the 
loyalist regiments. Many of them however remained on their 
farms and played important parts in the terrible internecine 
conflicts which devastated the frontier settlements of the 
Carolinas. 

It was in the colonies lying between the Hudson and the 
Potomac that the greatest diversity of race was ^^ „ 

° •' The People 

to be found. In New York there were the of the Middle 
Dutch, descendants of the first settlers, and now ° °"'^^' 
well reconciled to the English domination; but no Irish 
Catholics lived there before the Revolution, owing to the severe 
anti-Catholic laws till then in force in that colony. In the in- 
terior, along the banks of the lower Mohawk, dwelt a large and 
prosperous body of German settlers. This element at one 
time had been much larger, but many families had been lured 
to Pennsylvania by promises of lavish grants of land. In 
Pennsylvania, indeed, there were representatives of nearly 

1 — 2 



4 The Colonists, 1760-65. [Chap. 

every nation of Western Europe. Side by side with the de- 
scendants of the early Swedish, Dutch, and English colon- 
ists might be seen Germans of all shades of religious belief, 
Lutherans and Calvinists, Quakers and Mennonists, and other 
sects almost without number. There, too, were Spanish and 
Irish Roman Catholics — for in that colony the adherents of 
all Christian faiths enjoyed full civil rights. In New York 
and Pennsylvania, as well as in Rhode Island, there were 
Jewish congregations. In Pennsylvania only Christians could 
hold office, but in Rhode Island a Jew could obtain the right 
to vote by means of a special act of the colonial legislature. 
Nowhere was the Jewish element of much importance in 1760. 
It is clear from this brief statement of facts that there was no 
well-defined race which could be called American then living 
in the colonies. This will be made more evident, perhaps, 
by an analysis of the population according to colour and place 
of birth. 

About one-half of the colonists lived on either side of the 
^. .^ ,. southern boundary of Pennsylvania. This line had 

Distribution ■' ■' 

of thepopuia- been settled by an agreement between the heirs 
*^°°' of William Penn, founder of Pennsylvania, and 

those of Cecil Calvert, Lord Baltimore, under whose direction 
Maryland had been colonized. It was defined for a consid- 
erable distance by two English surveyors. Mason and Dixon. 
Separating Pennsylvania from Maryland and Virginia, Mason 
and Dixon's line at first divided the Northern Colonies, where 
agriculture was diversified, from the Southern Colonies, where 
one or two staple products were the rule. Later in the history 
of the country, it became the dividing line between the slave 
and free states east of the Appalachian Mountains; and, in 
this sense, has immortalized the names of its early surveyors. 
The statement that this line divided the population into two 
nearly equal parts requires further examination. There were 
in the colonies in 1760 about four hundred thousand negro 



I.] Distribution and Physical Conditions. 5 

slaves. Of these some three hundred thousand lived in the 
southern colonies, the remainder being owned and employed 
in the North, mainly in New York and Rhode Island. Sub- 
tracting the negro population from the total population of the 
two divisions, it is found that there were about seven hundred 
thousand whites in the North and not far from five hundred 
thousand whites in the South. Probably between four and five 
hundred thousand of the colonists were immigrants — including 
in this estimate seventy-five thousand negro slaves, for the 
slave-trade was then in active operation. The population of 
the colonies, therefore, was divided by race distinctions, by 
colour, and by length of exposure to colonial institutions. It 
would appear, in point of fact, that the problem of assimilating 
the "foreign element" was certainly not less serious in 1760 
than it has been at any other time in the history of the 
country. This was especially true because a majority of these 
recent immigrants were not English either by birth or by 
speech. Among them were some of the most prominent 
leaders in the Revolution. For example the first two great 
financiers of the United States, Robert Morris and Alexander 
Hamilton, were born outside of the colonies — and it may be 
added that Albert Gallatin, the only man among the early 
financiers who can claim a place with these two men, was like 
them born without the limits of the United States. Notwith- 
standing the great diversity of the population, race conflicts 
seem to have been very rare, and, except in New England, the 
immigrant was everywhere welcomed as an addition to the 
wealth of the country. 

The colonists then inhabited that portion of North America 
which lies between the thirty-first and the forty- 
fifth parallels of north latitude and between the condftlcms. 
Atlantic Ocean and the Appalachian Mountains. 
To understand the history of this people, it is necessary to 
know something of the conditions of life prevailing in this 



The Colonists, 1760-65. 



[Chap. 



region of their activity. One of the first things which im- 
presses the student is its general suitableness for colonization. 
There were scarcely any swamps to require expensive and long- 
continued draining, although, on the other hand, the land was 
covered with forests which had to be cleared away before hus- 
bandry could be begun. The new land was provided, however, 
with an agricultural product — the well-known Indian corn or 
maize — which throve on an irregular cultivation and supplied 
the colonists, after a few months, with the means of existence. 
Furthermore, this region was accessible from the sea to an extent 
scarcely equalled by any other country on the earth's surface. 
The colonies, therefore, were easily reached and easily made 
to produce enough food to save the colonists from starvation. 
The next thing to be noted is the fact that the climatic 
conditions were extraordinary. The following 
table, extracted from Professor Whitney's United 
States, will well repay a cursory examination. 



Climate and 
products. 



Mean Temperature of the 



Place. 
Nain, Labrador 
Aberdeen, Scotland 

St. John's, Newfoundland 
Brest, France 

Halifax, Nova Scotia 
Bordeaux 

New York 
Naples 

Norfolk, Virginia 
San Fernando, Spain 



Latitude. 


Year. 


Coldest 
month. 


Warmest 
month. 


57° 12' 


25°.l6 


3°.82 


5i°.o8| 
57°-74 i 


57° 12' 


46O.76 


37°.22 


47° 36' 
48° 24' 


40°. 10 

53O.60 


22°.46 

420.44 


59°-54 \ 
64°.76 1 


44° 42' 
44° 48' 


43°-34 
55°-04 


220.64 
420.44 


64°.40 \ 
69°.o8 ) 


40° 50' 
40° 48' 


5 1 0.08 
6i°.70 


28°.94 
48°.20 


75°.S6 \ 


36° 50' 
36° 30' 


59°i8 
63°.5o 


400.28 
52°-7o 


78°.62 ) 
760.10 j 



Diff. 
Year. 

21O.6 



i3°-5 
110.7 
io°.6 

4°-3 



It will be noted, for instance, that while the difference 
between the mean yearly temperatures of Aberdeen (Scotland) 
and San Fernando (Spain) is seventeen degrees, the difference 



I.] Climate, Products, and Employments. / 

between the mean yearly temperatures of Nain (Labrador) and 
Norfolk (Virginia) — situated in nearly the same latitudes as 
Aberdeen and San Fernando, is thirty-four degrees, or exactly 
double. Perhaps the dissimilarity of the climates of Europe 
and America can be best elucidated by comparing the climatic 
conditions of New York and Norfolk on one side of the Atlantic 
with those of Naples and San Fernando on the other side. 
The difference in latitude is about four degrees in each case. 
The difference in the temperatures of the coldest months in the 
European cities is four and one-half degrees against a difference 
of twelve degrees on the western side of the Atlantic. It may 
be added that, proceeding southward from Norfolk, a region is 
soon reached where the winters are comparatively mild. This 
sudden change in the isothermal lines indicates a great variety 
of climatic environments within a comparatively small area, 
with a corresponding diversity of agricultural produce, and, 
indeed, of general employments as well. New England, for 
example, produced fair crops of potatoes, onions, and Indian 
corn, provided the farmer devoted much labour and care to 
their cultivation. The Middle Colonies yielded large crops 
of Indian corn and wheat, at the cost of much less labour and 
care. Virginia produced tobacco of excellent quality and 
in great abundance; and the extreme southern colonies were 
remarkably well suited for the cultivation of rice and cotton. It 
can be seen, therefore, that in 1 7 60 a small population, scattered 
through a region eleven hundred miles long and three hundred 
miles wide, produced commodities associated in other lands 
with the northern, temperate, and tropical zones. 

This great diversity in employments and in conditions of 
life reacted on the habits and ideas of the people 
of the several sections and made against polit- erniTioyrnen^ts 
ical union throughout the whole history of the 
people inhabiting this country. Thus the New Englanders, 
able to wring a bare subsistence only from the soil, became, 



8 The Colonists, 1760-65. [Chap. 

almost of necessity, manufacturers, mechanics, and merchants. 
They ventured upon the ocean and carried the fame of Boston 
to every port open to Englishmen. They also became fisher- 
men and drew wealth from the shoals of fish which visited their 
shores. In whatever pursuit they entered, the New Englanders 
were almost invariably successful, and retired .in old age with 
competences — earned, however, by the most strenuous exer- 
tions and by great personal sacrifices. This hard struggle with 
nature and with man bred in them a shrewdness, unequalled 
perhaps, but not always admirable. The people of the Middle 
Colonies were beginning to turn their attention to the arts and 
to commerce. New York and Philadelphia were already large 
and prosperous seaports. But the most important interest of 
the Middle Colonies — in the pre-revolutionary days at least — 
was the production of food- stuffs. There the farms were large, 
and labour, to an extent unknown in New England, was supplied 
by "indented " white servants and by negro slaves. South of 
Mason and Dixon's line, the scene rapidly changed. As one 
proceeded southward, the cultivation of food-stuffs, except for 
local needs, diminished, and that of tobacco occupied the 
energies of the inhabitants. Following this change of product, 
slave labour became more frequent, until, in the rice and indigo 
producing colonies of South Carolina and Georgia, a white 
labourer was not to be found — except in the new settlements 
on the mountain slopes, where the conditions were similar to 
those which prevailed in the Middle Colonies. 

These several environments produced a marked effect on 
the social structures of the different sections. In 
difionT^ '^°"" New England, society was, so to speak, homo- 
geneous in its very variety. It is difficult to 
conceive of class distinctions in a country where one man per- 
formed many functions each year, and was perhaps, at one and 
the same time, interested in half a dozen employments — by 
turns a farmer, an artisan, a fisherman, or a trader, as the 



I-] Social Conditions. 9 

seasons or the work demanded. The chief inequality was in 
that of accumulated wealth; and the Calvinistic dogmas of 
the Congregational Church did much toward equalizing the 
lots of the rich and the poor. In the Middle Colonies the 
case was different. There the merchants of the great cities and 
the tillers of the river valleys were far apart in their ideas of 
life. The farmers of Central and Western Pennsylvania were 
the earliest and most earnest of democrats, holding ideas 
abhorrent to the feelings of their fellow colonists in Phila- 
delphia. 

In the South, society was based on an aristocratic model. 
There, land was held in large estates by a com- 
paratively small number of land and slave >rgmia. 
owners. In Virginia, these landowners possessed entire power 
in State and Church, tempered to a very slight extent by the 
presence of a royal governor. At the first glance, few positions 
in life seemed more desirable than that of the successful 
Virginia planter. In company with the Maryland planters, he 
possessed a monopoly of the British tobacco markets. Ex- 
cellent tobacco was produced in North Carolina; but, at that 
time, it was scarcely known outside the tobacco colonies. This 
was due to the fact that the most practicable route from the 
North Carolina tobacco fields to the seaboard was through 
Virginia. The tobacco growers of the latter colony imposed a 
small duty on all tobacco imported into Virginia and thus ex- 
cluded North Carolina tobacco from the markets of the world. 
The whole life of Virginia was dominated by the exigencies of 
tobacco culture. Large plantations, slave labour, poor and 
wasteful cultivation, a single crop with its attendant fluctua- 
tions, all appear to have been the direct result of tobacco 
growing. There was one commercial town in the tobacco 
colonies — Baltimore in Maryland. But Baltimore belonged to 
the valley of the Susquehanna and not to that of the Potomac 
— it was to most intents and purposes a Pennsylvania seaport. 



lO The Colonists, 1760-65. [Chap. 

The great arms of Chesapeake Bay — known as rivers — the 
James, the York, the Potomac and the rest, were navigable for 
long distances from the bay. The sea-going vessels loaded 
within a short distance of the tobacco fields — oftentimes within 
sight of the planter's verandah. Thus it came about that there 
was no business transacted in Virginia. The planter consigned 
his year's crop to his correspondent in London, sending also 
a long list of goods to be purchased there and sent out in the 
tobacco ships a year later. The temptation to order more 
goods than the proceeds of the tobacco would pay for was very 
great, and it was difficult, too, to calculate closely the precise 
amount that the tobacco would realize. At all events, the 
planter soon found himself in debt to the factor, and before 
long the proceeds of one year's crop would be used to pay the 
debts already contracted. So the process went on, the planter 
living in apparent comfort, yet always on the edge of bank- 
ruptcy. Of course, here and there, good managers could be 
found — like George Washington; — but it seems to have re- 
quired great skill and forbearance to make even a large planta- 
tion yield any net return. The Virginia planters were men of 
large proportions — managing affairs on a large scale and taking 
liberal views of everything, except when the interests of their 
own class were menaced; then they became as hard and narrow 
as the typical Yankee. There is something fascinating in the 
descriptions of the old Virginia houses and house-life which 
have been left by travellers of the olden time. Yet we know 
from the same travellers that, even in Virginia's best days, one 
might sit down to dinner in one of their splendid rooms — the 
table set with fine plate and the appetite sharpened with costly 
wines, when at the same time the window, out of which one 
looked, might lack several panes of glass, the door be without 
a knob, the shutters hanging by one hinge, and the whole 
mansion in a condition of partial ruin. This was due to the 
fact that negro slaves and free white mechanics seem never 



I •] Social Conditions. 1 1 

to have been able to thrive together. The glass for these 
planters' houses had been brought from England, and all the 
finished woodwork from the North, while the workman who 
put them together had been imported for that purpose. The 
blood and sinew of Virginia was in the middle class of whites, 
those owning small estates and a few slaves. They were in 
some cases ignorant, and generally lacked the polish of the 
great planters. They were of the best British stock, however, 
and capable of development. To this class belonged Patrick 
Henry and John Marshall, while Washington, Jefferson, 
Madison, and John Randolph represented the richer and more 
aristocratic class. 

The only other product which determined the whole life of 
a people was rice. It was produced mainly in 
South Carolina. Grown in malarial regions, its Planters of 
cultivation was fatal to the whites, and only less south Caro- 
so to the blacks. The rice planters, unlike their 
Virginia congeners, could not live on their plantations, except 
for a brief period in each year. They passed most of their time 
in the principal town of the colony, Charleston — which enjoyed 
the almost unique position of being a capital, a business metrop- 
olis, and a summer resort all in one. The rice planters formed 
a well-knit aristocracy. The handling of the crop was performed 
by the merchants of Charleston, men of means and enterprise. 
Many of the men of both these classes had been educated in 
England or in the North. In their hands centred all power, 
for government was centralized in South Carolina as it was in 
no other colony. They formed a true oligarchy. Born and 
bred to habits of command, they enjoyed an influence far 
beyond what their numerical importance or their wealth would 
seem to justify. South Carolina was prosperous in 1 760 — forty 
years before the profitable cultivation of cotton began. This 
prosperity rested to a great extent on the use of slave labour, 
which seems to have been considered essential to the well- 



12 The Colonists, 1760-65. [Chap. 

being of South Carolina in 1760, as it was deemed to be one 
hundred years later. 

Slavery existed in all the colonies before the Revolution. 
In the North it was everywhere dying out because it was un- 
profitable, except on the shores of Narragansett Bay and on the 
banks of the Hudson River. In Boston and New 

Negro 

Slavery: North York City the possession of a young negro was 
^" °"* ■ regarded as undesirable. There does not seem 

to have been any widespread moral sentiment against slavery, 
but the institution had no place in the economic environment 
of the northern colonists. South of Mason and Dixon's line 
this was not true. The following definition of the word slaves 
taken from the early Virginia statutes is interesting for many 
reasons. It reads as follows : 

"All persons who have been imported into the colony and 
who were not Christians in their native country — except Turks 
and Moors in amity with his Majesty, and those who can prove 
their being free in England, or in any other Christian country — 
shall be accounted and be slaves, shall be bought and sold, 
notwithstanding their conversion to Christianity after their 
importation." 

From this it can be seen that slavery was regarded by the 

Virginians as justifiable because the slaves be- 

siavery in ^^^.g importation were not Christians, so that 

Virginia. ^ ' 

the knowledge of Christianity given them in 
Virginia might be considered as an equivalent for the 
use of their bodies during life. This was the ground upon 
which slavery was justified for many years. One of the best 
means of determining the extent to which slavery has eaten 
into the body politic is to observe the stringency of the laws 
designed to prevent the amalgamation of the two races and to 
prevent insurrection. That slavery was a firmly established 
institution in Virginia becomes evident when one reads in the 
statutes of the Old Dominion that a white man marrying a 



I.] Negro Slavery. 13 

negress shall be banished and the clergyman who performed 
the marriage service shall be subject to a heavy fine. A negro 
found abroad after nine o'clock at night might be dismembered, 
and no penalty beset the slave-owner whose slave died during or 
in consequence of punishment. In Virginia, there were many 
white bondservants working and living with the negro slaves. 
This probably mitigated to some extent the lot of the slave. 
Moreover the cultivation of tobacco was healthful and easy; 
and, taking everything into consideration, the treatment of the 
blacks, while harsh in comparison with that in New York, 
seems to have been mild when compared with their usage by 
the planters of South Carolina. 

In the latter colony the slaves were largely men and 
women of African birth, carried to Charleston 

Slavery m 

and other southern seaports from the western South Caro- 
coast of Africa by the northern slave-traders. '"^' 
They were, therefore, more savage and uncivilized than were 
the negroes of the tobacco colonies, who were mostly descendants 
of slaves brought over in the preceding century. The South 
Carolina negroes may have required harsher treatment to keep 
them in subjection. Moreover the conditions of labour in the 
rice colonies were far more severe than farther north. Even the 
negroes could stand the pestilential rice swamps for a few years 
only. It became profitable, therefore, to work them to the best 
advantage during their years of greatest vigour. This naturally 
tended to increase the severity of their treatment. Another 
thing which made in the same direction was the fact that the 
owner was absent from his plantation during the greater part of 
the year. Thus instead of the patriarchal form which slavery 
assumed in Virginia, in South Carolina it was simply a business 
matter. The slaves and the plantation were handed over to an 
enterprising overseer; and the best overseer was he who secured 
the most advantageous returns. Finally, the fact that the blacks 
outnumbered the whites necessarily led to most stringent laws. 



14 The Colonists, 1760-65. [Chap. 

Slave insurrections occurred from time to time; and a for- 
midable one in 1740 led to a revision of the slave laws of the 
colony. A few points gathered from this revised code will 
demonstrate the extent to which slavery dominated South 
Carolina. In the first place the greatest care was taken to 
prevent slaves from combining against the whites and securing 
fire-arms. No one, not even a slave's master, could permit 
a slave to have a gun in his possession after sundown; and all 
slaves found on the high road at any time could be stopped 
and arrested unless they could show a "ticket" from the 
master permitting them to leave the plantation. The legislators 
were especially fearful lest the blacks congregating at Charleston 
on some holiday or some Saturday afternoon or Sunday should 
massacre the whites in a body. To prevent this, no master 
could give his slave a "ticket" to visit Charleston at such 
times under penalty of a heavy fine. In the second place, the 
judicial procedure in the case of a negro slave was peculiar. 
Jury trials were held only when a negro claimed his freedom. 
All other cases in which negroes were concerned were tried by 
a court at which one justice with two freeholders in capital 
cases, and a justice with one freeholder in less important cases, 
formed a quorum. In the latter class of trials, the justice 
gave the decision with the consent of the freeholder. In 
capital cases the trial was to be held within six days of the 
apprehension of the alleged negro offender, and execution 
followed immediately on the giving the sentence. This was 
substantially the system in vogue until 1865. Among the 
capital crimes in 1760 were running away, wounding a white 
person, burning or destroying rice, corn, grain, pitch, etc. 
To limit, if possible, the practice of escaping to the Spanish 
settlements in Florida, considerable rewards were offered for the 
apprehension of negroes south of the Savannah River — the 
rewards in 1740 being ^50 if alive or _;^io for the scalp. The 
ordinary reward for the scalp of a runaway negro was ^\. 



I.] White Servants and Convicts. 15 

A very considerable portion of the labour of the colonies 
was provided by the employment of white persons \fq^-^ 
bound to service for a term of years. Some of vants and 
these servants came to America of their own ac- '=°"^'<=*^- 
cord and sold their services to secure the means to provide for 
the expenses of the transfer from the old world to the new. 
These were called " Redemptioners " or "Free Willers," and 
were a most respectable and desirable class of immigrants. 
They were to be found most largely in Pennsylvania. At the 
termination of their terms of service they were given a start in 
life by the colony and the master, the colony furnishing land, 
and the master agricultural implements. Another class of 
bondservants were not so desirable, namely the " indented " 
servants drawn from the criminal classes of Great Britain. 
The Habeas Corpus Act of 1679 provided, among other things, 
that no subject should be sent to foreign prisons, or to parts 
beyond the seas, except those who in open court should 
request to be transported. Early in the reign of George I, 
Parliament provided that persons sentenced to whipping and 
branding might have their sentences commuted to seven years' 
service in the colonies; those liable to capital punishment 
might satisfy the requirements of justice by fourteen years' 
service; in either case, return to Britain before the expiration 
of the term of service was punishable with death. The con- 
tractors, who paid the expenses of the transportation of the 
convicts, were entitled to the services of such persons for 
the required terms and might assign their rights to others. 
Two other acts were passed "for the more speedy and ef- 
fectual transportation of criminals," and the practice was 
continued till 1770 at least. For reasons not now clearly 
ascertainable most of these convicts were sent to Maryland 
and Virginia — indeed, those colonies seem to have been re- 
garded almost in the light of penal settlements. The people 
of Virginia and Maryland strenuously objected to this influx 



i6 TJie Colonists, 1760-65. [Chap. 

of criminals; and sought to keep them out by laws imposing 
head money and long quarantines. But these laws, as well as 
those designed to prevent the importation of negro slaves, 
were annulled or vetoed by the king. The great mass of the 
immigrants who came over in the first half of the eighteenth 
century were either "Free Willers" or, more often, persons 
who paid their own expenses. It will be interesting to note 
some of the reasons which induced these immigrants to settle 
in one colony rather than in another. 

The chief attractions seem to have been (i) the enjoyment 

of civil rights, (2) freedom to exercise one's own 
Religion and religion, and (3) the prospect of becoming an 

owner of land. By this time the best land near 
the sea-coast was already occupied. But there were still vast 
tracts in the interior, either on or near navigable streams, to 
be had for the asking. In Virginia, in order to secure fifty 
acres of land for himself and for each adult member of his 
family, the immigrant was only obliged to present himself at 
the proper office with the necessary papers. In some cases, 
grants of land were made to a prospective immigrant before his 
departure from Europe. Oftentimes, with a grant of land, 
there would be given a further inducement in the shape of an 
exemption from taxation for a certain number of years. 

Religious considerations, however, had more weight than 
any other one thing in determining the direction of an immi- 
grant's course. New England was still Puritan in religion 
and in the conduct of daily life, and, as a matter of fact, 
remained so for a half century longer. But as the Puritan 
movement had long ceased in England, there were no 
emigrants of that persuasion. Consequently the religious 
appearance of New England, during the eighteenth century, 
deterred foreigners from seeking its shores. There was, in- 
deed, a smaller proportional emigration to the Eastern Colo- 
nies than to any other section. As has been said, the land was 



I.] Religious Disabilities. 17 

already fully occupied. The New Englanders themselves 
became emigrants later on, exchanging the rocky and sandy 
soil of the interior and the coast for the fertile valleys of the 
Mohawk and the Ohio and the coasts of the Great Lakes. 

The Roman Catholic, who desired to better his condition 
by emigration to the western world, found only one colony, 
Pennsylvania, where he was accorded full civil and religious 
liberty. Rhode Island, usually so liberal in 
religious matters, had on her statute book a law c^hoiks™^" 
excluding the Roman Catholics from the exer- 
cise of the franchise. A law of New York, passed in 1700 
and not repealed until after the Revolution, provided that, after 
the first day of November of that year, a Roman Catholic 
priest found within the limits of the colony should be " ad- 
judged to suffer perpetual imprisonment; and if any person, 
being so sentenced, and actually imprisoned, shall break prison 
and make his escape, and be afterward retaken, he shall suffer 
such pains of death, penalties, and forfeitures as in cases of 
felony." It is, perhaps, needless to say, that in all the other 
colonies, excepting Pennsylvania, Roman Catholics were de- 
prived of the right to vote until after the Revolution. Maryland, 
which had been settled under Roman Catholic auspices, was 
now in the hands of the Protestants. There were many Roman 
Catholics in Maryland, descendants of the early settlers. They 
were treated with a harshness likely to deter others of that faith 
from entering the colony. They were excluded from office, 
disfranchised, obliged to pay a double land tax, and to con- 
tribute toward the support of the Established Church. In 
Virginia, however, we find the severest laws against the Roman 
Catholic laymen, probably because the Virginians feared an 
incursion from Maryland. In the Old Dominion a Roman 
Catholic could not vote or bear witness in any case whatever 
in a court of law, not even against his own negro slave, 
nor possess fire-arms of any description. In view of these 
C. A. 2 



1 8 The Colonists, 1760-65. [Chap. 

facts, it is not surprising that nearly all the colonists were 
Protestants. 

To the Protestant Dissenter all the colonies were open. 

In Virginia and in Maryland the Church of Eng- 
Di^serTters"* ^^^^ ^^^ ^y ^^'^ already established; but in the 

latter colony, where the Dissenters were very 
numerous, this meant little more than the payment each year, 
towards the "Established" parson's salary, of a small amount 
of the poorest tobacco obtainable. In Virginia, on the contrary, 
the Church establishment was in the hands of the planting 
aristocracy. It was one of the bulwarks of the social fabric of 
the Old Dominion, and, therefore, was guarded with particular 
solicitude. Towards the middle of the century the Protestant 
Dissenters suddenly acquired increased strength and became 
very active. This aroused the fears and jealousy of the 
aristocracy to such an extent, that very stringent and harsh 
laws were passed, designed to check the progress of Dissent. 
Notwithstanding this discouragement, the Dissenters poured 
into the back regions of the colony, while Dissent gained 
rapidly in strength in the older settled portions. In 1763, 
Patrick Henry, whose mother was a Presbyterian, stated in 
a court of law, without arousing ill-feeling except among the 
clergy, that the only justification for the existence of the 
Established Church was its value as a police organization. 
Before dismissing the subject of religious qualifications and 

disqualifications, it will be well, perhaps, to de- 
of'Eng:?and.'^'^ scribe more fully the position occupied by the 

Established Church. It had its representatives 
in nearly all, if not all the colonies, but it was established by law 
in only two — Maryland and Virginia. Curiously enough, the 
Church in those colonies was in a worse condition than in many 
others. This was due to the fact that the venerable Society 
for the Propagation of the Gospel (according to the rites of 
the Church of England) in Foreign Parts, provided admirable 



I.] The Established Ch7irch. 19 

men for its mission stations in New England and in the South, 
where the religious competition was keen, but left Virginia 
and Maryland to the care of the metropolitan, the Bishop of 
London, who was charged with their supervision. The bishop 
was represented by an officer termed a Commissary. But the 
Commissaries had great difficulties to contend with. In Mary- 
land there was constant friction between the Church and the 
State, and in Virginia the vestries, controlled by the planters, 
had obtained entire control of the patronage of the Church, 
and refused to hire a parson for more than a year at a time. 
They thus held the clergy in a state of subjection. Of course 
there were many admirable clergymen in both these colonies, 
but in general it may be stated that in Virginia the clergy 
condoned the vices of their patrons, and in Maryland some 
of them surpassed their parishioners in all that was bad, so 
that the phrase "a Maryland parson" became a term of 
reproach. In these circumstances, it seemed desirable to have 
an American bishop in direct charge of the clergy of the 
Church of England in the colonies. It happened, , , 

° rr ' An American 

however, that in England the bishop enjoyed Bishop pro- 
considerable civil power. It was stated over ^°^^ 
and over again that any bishop who might be appointed for 
America would have only such civil power as the laws of each 
colony might give him. The Dissenters, forming the great 
mass of the people, felt that, although this might be the case 
in the beginning, in the end the bishop would surely gain 
a great deal of power. They enlisted the sympathies of their 
fellow Dissenters in England and in this way prevented any such 
appointment from being made. Nor was the case much better 
with the American clergy. They, with few exceptions, did not 
want a bishop. Some of them even refused to have the honour 
thrust upon them, A Maryland clergyman, who finally set out 
for England to obtain consecration, was met at the point of 
embarkation by a writ of ne exeat I'egno which prevented his 

2 — 2 



20 The Colonists, 1760-65. [Chap. 

leaving the colony. This contest, however, kept alive a spirit 
of opposition to England, which some students regard as 
among the most potent causes of the Revolution; but very 
likely the matter has been exaggerated. Later on, the Revolu- 
tion, by doing away with the authority of English law in the 
United States, at once removed all objections to the appoint- 
ment of a bishop, and since that time the Episcopal Church 
has shown great vitality. 

The third great inducement to a Protestant immigrant from 
„ ^ ,. without the dominions of the British monarch 

Naturaliza- 
tion of foreign was the enjoyment of full civil rights within the 

rotestants. limits of the English colonies. This was a wide 
departure from the practice of other nations, and from earlier 
English usage. The historical importance of this first step 
toward breaking down the doctrine of inalienable allegiance 
can hardly be overestimated. It is important also to under- 
stand the position of the British Parliament at this period 
in connection with the subsequent impressment controversy 
between the United States and Great Britain. The British 
Parliament in 1740 passed an Act (13 Geo. II, cap. 7) con- 
ferring all civil rights within the colonies — though not in Great 
Britain — on foreign Protestants who had resided there for 
seven years. In addition, many of the colonies passed laws 
conferring rights of citizenship within the colony after a much 
shorter period of residence, in some cases requiring only one 
year. The policy outlined in these acts has been followed 
in the United States ever since. The religious qualification 
disappeared at the Revolution, and the only exception to the 
enjoyment of full civil rights is the provision in the Constitution 
that the President of the United States must be native born. 
The period of residence has been changed twice. It is now 
five years in the general law. Many bands of immigrants, to 
return to colonial times, were naturalized by special colonial 
acts before their departure from their old homes. 



I.] Natui'alisation and Education. 21 

The eighteenth century is remarkable for the rise of the 
legal profession in the colonies as well as in 
England. At the time now under review, profl^ssion^' 
Blackstone was writing his Conunentaries, and 
Mansfield and Camden occupied the two foremost places 
on the bench. In America, even in New England, where 
the clergy had long held an undisputed sway, the lawyers 
were fast becoming the leaders of political thought. James 
Otis and John Adams in Massachusetts, Stephen Hopkins 
and William Ellery in Rhode Island, Roger Sherman and 
Oliver Ellsworth in Connecticut, wielded a power equalled only 
by that of the Puritan divines of a century before. Robert 
R. Livingston and John Jay of New York, with Andrew 
Hamilton and Thomas McKean of Pennsylvania, were among 
the founders of the renowned bars of those colonies. In Vir- 
ginia, Patrick Henry and Thomas Jefferson, with the Pendletons 
and Randolphs, formed a brilliant group, while South Carolina 
furnished several able lawyers like the Rutledges and the 
Pinckneys. These lawyers were all learned in the Common 
Law, and many of them were well versed in the Constitutional 
History of England. They gave a legal and constitutional cast 
to the earlier phases of the Revolution. Later, in combination 
with business men and men of affairs, they elaborated in the 
most durable and efficient forms the constitutions of the several 
states, and, later still,- the constitution of the nation. 

The medical profession was just starting into vigorous life; 
and the seat of the earliest medical school was in Philadelphia. 
A small and active set of men had also made some progress in 
the direction of physical science, and the names of Benjamin 
Franklin and David Rittenhouse are even now held in high 
esteem by scientific men. Philadelphia was also the seat of 
the beginnings of university education in America, for there 
was founded the first school having as its object scientific and 
not theological investigation. 



22 The Colonists, 1760-65. [Chap. 

There were then in the colonies some half-dozen institu- 
tions of learning, bearing the designations of 
Coifeges. college or university : Harvard, Yale, King's (now 

Columbia), New Jersey (better known as- Prince- 
ton), Pennsylvania, and William and Mary. With the excep- 
tion of the University of Pennsylvania, they all owed their 
origin to the desire of the communities in which they were 
placed for a learned ministry of some particular faith. Thus 
Harvard, the oldest of them, was founded in 1636 to supply 
clergymen of the Independent persuasion, while Yale was 
founded at the beginning of the next century to furnish Puritan 
divines of a slightly different dye ; King's was in the hands of 
the Episcopalians, Princeton was a Presbyterian seminary, and 
Commissary Blair had secured the endowment for William and 
Mary to provide Virginia with an efficient clergy of the 
Established Church. The University of Pennsylvania was due 
largely to Franklin, to whom all religions were much alike. 
Founded in 1 749 on a liberal basis, it proved very successful 
and grew rapidly. In 1756, there were four hundred students 
on its list. None of these institutions were much above the 
grade of high schools ; still they produced some good scholars 
of the older type and kept alive a love of learning. Students 
came to them from all parts of the British Empire, attracted, 
in many cases, by the soundness of their theology in some one 
direction. On the other hand, many young men went to 
England for an education. This was notably the case as to 
the sons of the rice planters of South Carolina, and, to a lesser 
extent, of the tobacco growers of Virginia. 

The system of free public schools had its rise in New 

England in the middle of the seventeenth century. 

Education!^ ^^^ "^^7 ^^ regarded as an offspring of the 

English Reformation. In most places, provision 

was made for the teaching of reading, writing, and elementary 

mathematics ; but the larger towns were required to provide suf- 



!•] Secondary Education. 23 

ficient instruction to fit students for college. At the beginning 
of the Revolution, Rhode Island, alone of the New England 
colonies, had no free public school system. The Dutch had 
provided educational facilities for their children in New Nether- 
land. After the English conquest, however, constant disputes 
had arisen as to the maintenance of these schools at the public 
expense, as they were intimately connected with the religious 
establishments of the conquered Dutch. This was unfavour- 
able to the extension, and even to the existence, of a free school 
system; and, as late as 1760, there does not appear to have 
been any provision for general pubhc instruction in New York. 
In New Jersey and Pennsylvania, the Quakers and Presby- 
terians were strenuous in their efforts to establish a system of 
free public education. The "log colleges," maintained by the 
latter sect in the remoter parts of Pennsylvania, served a most 
useful purpose, and may be regarded as the prototype of the 
" district school " of a later day. Nowhere was greater effort 
made to educate the immigrants than in Pennsylvania; and 
nowhere does education seem to have been more highly prized. 
The legislature of Maryland had provided in 1723 for the 
establishment in every county of a school where grammar, 
writing, and mathematics should be taught by a member of the 
Established Church. Something was done towards carrying 
this policy into effect ; but interest in the matter was short- 
lived, and the religious tone given to the schools in a colony, 
where the Dissenters were very numerous, accounts, in part at 
least, for the failure of the scheme. There were a few schools 
supported by general taxation in the colony ; but they were 
feeble in every respect and exerted little influence. The con- 
ditions of Hfe in Virginia made it difficult to provide educational 
faciHties for the whites. Efforts had been made, from time to 
time, to remedy the defect of a total lack of schools, but with 
slight success. WilHam and Mary College resembled in many 
respects an English public school of the old days. Most of the 



24 The Colonists, 1760-65. [Chap. 

more prosperous planters employed private teachers — generally 
clergymen — and these, in combination with the college, fur- 
nished the young Virginians of the higher class with an 
excellent education. The love of reading seems to have 
been widespread in the Old Dominion; and the colony con- 
tained in 1760 a goodly number of men, who were fair classical 
scholars and were very familiar with English history and 
constitutional precedents. There does not seem to have been 
an educational institution of any kind in North Carolina in 
1760. The legislature of that colony had made provision for 
the founding of a seminary of learning; but the act had been 
vetoed by the king. It should be stated, however, that two 
schools were founded in North Carolina within the next ten 
years. There was no system of general education in South 
Carolina, and the mass of the white population was without 
any means of securing knowledge. On the other hand, the 
richer planters were well educated. Taking the colonies all 
through, and bearing in mind the large number of recent immi- 
grants, it may be said that the mass of the whites possessed the 
rudiments of learning, and that a very large proportion of them 
were well educated. For learning itself the colonists had little 
sympathy, although they recognized the desirability of knowl- 
edge for the power it conferred on its possessor; this, indeed, 
was their method of estimating the value of nearly everything. 
There was little intercourse between the people of the several 
colonies in 1760, and almost none, in fact, 
colonial com- between the people of the North and the South, 
munication. rpj^^ roads, cvcn in the older settled regions, were 
few in number and very poor in quality — for the most part 
being mere "dirt-roads," almost impassable during a portion 
of the year. Throughout the colonies, settlement was restricted 
mainly to places within easy distance of navigable water. 
Nearly all the inter-colonial communication was by water, and, 
at best, was very difificult, not to say dangerous. The passage 



!•] Inter-colonial Communication. 25 

which is now made in one night by the large steamboats which 
ply on Long Island Sound then required a week's time and 
often more. In England, the era of coaching was beginning ; 
but on the western side of the Atlantic, colonial roads and lack 
of business warranted no such regular and expensive accommo- 
dation — except for short distances in the vicinity of the larger 
towns. It then cost as much to send a letter from New York 
to Boston as it cost to send a letter from New York to London, 
and one-third as much to send a letter sixty miles inland from 
New York as to either of the cities just mentioned. Nor was 
the rate low enough to encourage frequent communication, as 
it cost a dollar to send one ounce of mail matter from New 
York to Boston ; the same service is now performed for one- 
fiftieth of that sum — not taking into account the difference in 
the value of money. In 1766, the rates for inter-colonial water 
communication were reduced to one- third of the 1760 rate. 
Owing mainly to the great expense attending the transportation 
of commodities and the spread of " news," the conditions of 
colonial life, away from the larger towns, were not unlike those 
which prevailed in England in the Middle Ages. The greatest 
differences, perhaps, were to be found in a change in ideals 
and in the possibihties of existence. 

Most colonists realized that there was a better mode of Hfe 
than that which they were obliged to lead. They 
knew also that the way to that better mode of ide^s. ' 
living — so far, at least, as they were concerned — 
lay in the possession of wealth. Wealth also conferred power 
on its possessor. In common with many other persons they 
confounded money with wealth, and in this way the acquisition 
of money became the one great all-absorbing task of the 
colonists. In England, as well as in Western Europe, the old 
social systems remained. In those countries a man ordinarily 
lived and died a member of the class into which he had been 
born — an agricultural labourer or a mechanic seldom attained 



26 The Colonists, 1760-65. [Chap. 

any higher grade. In the colonies the class distinctions, which 
rested on the written and unwritten laws of society, were fast 
disappearing. As the second half of the eighteenth century is 
passed in review, the attentive student will observe that in the 
colonies each year saw some social barrier swept away — one 
might almost say that each month saw something done toward 
the democratization of colonial society. It thus came about 
that the possession of wealth on the western side of the 
Atlantic Ocean was equivalent to a patent of nobility in 
Great Britain. Few travellers understood the meaning of the 
intense struggle for wealth which all recognized as dominating 
American life. The people seemed to be struggling for money 
for its own sake, so to speak. In reality, they were intent 
on its acquisition for the power and social position its pos- 
session would confer on the possessor and his family. The 
ignorant immigrant, in this regard, evinced more intelligence 
than the cultured traveller. In his old home in Great Britain 
or Ireland, he led an easy careless existence. In the new 
world he rose early and worked the day through with a 
feverish anxiety as if conscious that every tree he felled 
on his little clearing in the wilderness placed him nearer his 
goal. In all this, however, the mainspring of his action was a 
most commendable desire to seize the opportunity which was 
suddenly placed before his eyes to better his condition. In 
thus raising his own level, the colonist felt that he was working 
toward the bettering of the condition of all the colonists and 
indeed of the human race. He seemed to be conscious of the 
grandeur of the undertaking, and "appealed to the world" in 
justification of his course. 

The "English colonies" on the continent comprised, in 

1760, thirteen governments. They may be 

Governments described as belonging to one of two forms, 

royal provinces governed directly by the Crown, 

and colonies in which the right to exercise many of the func- 



I.] Constitutioital Position of the Colonists. 27 

tions of the Crown had been delegated to persons called 
proprietaries or to the voters of the colony as in the cases 
of Connecticut and Rhode Island. The English settlers, to 
whichever colony they went, carried with them to their new 
homes "as much of the common law of England as was 
applicable to their condition." The qualification, contained 
in this latter phrase, made the constitutional relations of the 
colonists to the Crown and to Parliament very vague and 
uncertain, and different as to the inhabitants of the several 
colonies, or of the same colony at different stages in its develop- 
ment. The title of the king of England to the soil was based 
on the discovery of John Cabot, so far as other Christian mon- 
archs were concerned. According to English legal theories, 
the king was lord of the soil as territory conquered from the 
Indians. Acting on this theory, successive monarchs had 
granted a large part of North America to single proprietors, to 
groups of proprietors, and to corporations. Most of these 
grants had in one way or another returned to the Crown, 
except as to rights which had become "vested." Some of 
them had been confirmed or regranted under other con- 
ditions. In 1774, Jefferson in his Summary View stated a 
different theory as to the ownership of the soil. He said, in 
substance, that the soil of the colonies belonged to the com- 
munities by whose exertions it had been converted to the uses 
of man, that is to the colonists themselves. The British 
government had no doubts as to the validity of the legal theory. 
In 1763 the king, by proclamation, established the water- 
parting between the rivers flowing into the Atlantic and those 
discharging into the Mississippi as the western boundary of the 
seaboard colonies. This seriously limited the extent of many 
colonies; but his right so to limit them does not seem to have 
been questioned at that time. In the period of the Revolution, 
however, the colonists treated the Proclamation of 1763 as of 
no legal force. 



28 The Colonists, 1760-65. [Chap. 

The king held the same position toward the colonists, 
„, „ with the exception of the inhabitants of New 

The Crown ^ 

and the York, that he held toward the people of Great 

CO onis s. Britain. They were all subjects of the English 

Crown. The colony of New York, however, had been settled 
originally by the Dutch and had been conquered by the English 
about a century before the time of which we are now speaking. 
Over it as a conquered colony, and not as one which had been 
originally settled by Englishmen under license from the Crown, 
the king wielded authority which he did not possess in the 
other colonies. For years after the conquest. New York had no 
representative assembly; but this had been remedied and the 
government of New York had been assimilated to that of the 
other royal provinces. The king could not tax English sub- 
jects without their consent, nor could he authorize others so to 
do. Legislative bodies had been established, therefore, in all 
the colonies, save New York, soon after their settlement. The 
earliest of these v/as the Virginia General Assembly, which 
met for the first time in 16 19. The king's prerogative ex- 
tended to the colonies, and the judges were appointed by 
him or by his agents. He was also the head of the military 
establishment, and where there was a Church establishment he 
was the head of the Church as well. The royal rights were 
oftentimes vigorously enforced. The best example of this, 
perhaps, was the enforcement of the title of the Crown to 
a share in the catch of whales and other "royal fish" on the 
American coast. 

In the earlier time, the kings, beginning, with James I, 
„ ,. , had denied to Parliament any share in the 

Parliament -' 

and the direction of colonial affairs. But during the 

CO cms s. Puritan regime, the Long Parliament had taken 

the control of colonial affairs into its hands; after the 
Restoration, Parliament continued to regulate colonial trade 
without any protest from the Crown. The Revolution of 



I.] Representative Institutions. 29 

1688-89, by making Parliament supreme in the State, com- 
pletely altered the existing relations between Parliament and 
the colonial legislative bodies. But before 1761 the colonists 
had, tacitly at least, acknowledged the supremacy of the 
Imperial Parliament. They had not objected to the regulation 
of colonial trade by act of Parliament. They had accepted 
without remark the Post Office Act of Queen Anne, which 
really levied a direct tax on the colonists; and no protest had 
been raised against the act establishing the New Style, which 
affected the daily life of every colonist. No direct issue had 
been raised as to the power of Parliament to levy taxes. 
It will be convenient to describe in this place, however, the 
difference which existed between colonial representative insti- 
tutions and those of Great Britain, for in that difference lay the 
key to the constitutional opposition to the acts of Parliament 
in the years 1 761-17 74. 

The phrase "no taxation without representation" was fa- 
miliar to both sections of the British people; 

r r 7 Representa- 

but it conveyed very different meanings to the tive Govern- 
people of Great Britain and to those of the "^"*' 
English colonies. The members of the British House of 
Commons were elected in 1760 in accordance with a system 
which was in itself the growth of centuries of British history. 
The House of Commons may be said to have fairly repre- 
sented the several classes of the community — the landowners 
and their tenants and labourers, the merchants and their 
clerks and other employees, the manufacturers and their work- 
men, the Church, and the legal profession. Although its 
members were chosen on a basis both of apportionment and 
franchise, which would not now be tolerated in Great Britain, 
they were amenable to public opinion and may be regarded as 
giving the consent of the people of Great Britain to the levying 
of taxes. In the colonies, representation was apportioned on 
a territorial basis, an attempt being made in a few colonies 



30 The Colonists, 1760-65 [Chap. 

roughly to adjust it to population. The franchise was ordi- 
narily exercised by all adult male whites possessing a 
moderate amount of property. Plural voting was seldom 
permitted and representatives were paid for their services. 
The representatives chosen were ordinarily men living in the 
district in which they were elected. A colonist in using the 
phrase "no taxation without representation" meant "no tax- 
ation except by vote of a legislative body in which a person 
known to me and in whose election I have taken part has a 
seat." An Englishman, using the same phrase, had in his 
mind an idea which can be expressed in the sentence : " no 
taxation except by vote of the House of Commons." 

The vast majority of Englishmen did not vote for a 

member of Parliament, but all Englishmen were 
resentation.^^" ^^^^ to be virtually represented. It was easy to 

extend the theory and to argue that the colonists 
were virtually represented as well; and in a measure they were, 
because merchants interested in the American trade sat in the 
House of Commons or voted for members of that body. Lord 
Mansfield stated the theory in a clear manner in his learned 
speech against the repeal of the Stamp Act. He said : " There 
can be no doubt but that the inhabitants of the colonies are as 
much represented in Parliament as the greatest part of the 
people of England are, among nine millions of whom, there 
are eight who have no vote in electing members to Parliament. 
A member of Parliament chosen for any borough, represents 
not only the constituents and inhabitants of that particular 
place, but he represents the City of London, and all the 
Commons of the land, and the inhabitants of all the colonies 
and dominions of Great Britain. " American writers contended, 
that, granting the soundness of the general theory of virtual 
representation, there was still a difference in the position 
of Englishmen having no vote and that of the colonists. 
Members of Parliament, they argued, were singly and collec- 



I.] The Imperial Protectio7i Policy. 3 1 

tively responsible both physically and morally to the English 
people and to English public opinion, while it was impossible 
for the colonists to appeal either to their fears or to their inter- 
ests. There can be no doubt of the legal soundness of Lord 
Mansfield's argument. Parliament was the supreme legisla- 
tive body of the Empire under the existing constitution. As it 
refused to part with any portion of its power, the only remedy 
was revolution. 

Before the middle of the eighteenth century. Parliament 
exercised little authority over the colonies ex- 
cept in the matter of trade regulations. This tiorflcts^*^^ 
system was designed to promote the interests 
of all parts of the Empire, those of some in one way, those of 
others in other ways. The leading acts establishing this 
Imperial protection policy were mainly those of Charles II and 
the 7 and 8 William III, cap. 22. These provided that no goods 
should be imported into or exported out of the colonies except 
in vessels built within the British dominions and owned and 
navigated by subjects of the British Crown. It is especially 
important to observe that this system was intended to confine 
the trade of the British Empire to British subjects. The 
colonists shared in this monopoly; and under its stimulus, 
the colonial ship-building and ship-owning interests flourished 
greatly. It was further intended to give the profits which 
should arise from the handling of the staple products of the 
Empire to British merchants. This was accomplished by pro- 
viding that certain commodities, which were enumerated in 
several acts, should be carried to Great Britain alone. These 
" enumerated goods " included, among others, tobacco, cotton, 
indigo, copper ore, and furs, all of them products of the 
"English Colonies" on the continent of North America. To 
partly compensate the colonists for the loss of the direct trade 
of continental Europe, the tobacco growers of Virginia and 
Maryland were substantially given a monopoly of the tobacco 



32 The Colonists, 1760-65. [chap. 

trade of the Empire. On such of these "enumerated" com- 
modities as were liable to duty on importation into Great Britain, 
a drawback was allowed at the time of exportation. When it 
was found that the cost of re-handling in England by increasing 
the price prevented the sale, as in the case of rice destined for 
Mediterranean ports, such commodity was excluded from the 
general operation of the acts. In this way, South Carolina rice 
destined for ports north of Cape Finisterre had to be first 
landed in Great Britain, but rice destined for ports south of 
Cape Finisterre might be carried direct from South Carolina. 
Frequently bounties and premiums were provided, as in the 
case of naval stores, hemp, masts, and spars. Among the acts 
designed to protect and stimulate the industries of the English 
West India Islands was one laying a prohibitory duty on 
sugar and molasses imported into the continental colonies from 
any foreign port. This act, had it been enforced, would haVe 
inflicted great hardships on the people of New England. But 
it was systematically evaded by the colonial merchants in 
collusion with the customs authorities. It is impossible to 
state whether the net result of this system, taken as a whole, 
was in favour of Great Britain or of the colonies. As a matter 
of fact, the colonies were very prosperous under it. This may 
have been due to the fact that the laws which might have borne 
heavily on the colonists were practically obsolete. As to the 
restrictions on manufacturing,, there can be no doubt that they 
inflicted damage on colonial interests. 

The idea of the English authors of this part of the system 

seems to have been to keep the British iron mills 

on Colonial busy and at the same time to stimulate the produc- 

manufactur- ^jqj^ q[ crude iron in the colonies. To carry out 

ing. 

this policy, pig and bar iron were admitted free of 
duty to British ports, and the manufacture of iron in the colonies 
beyond the stage of bar-iron was absolutely prohibited. The 
attempt was also made to restrict the colonial manufacture of 



I.] The Supremacy of Parliament. 33 

hats to the actual needs of the colonists and thus prevent com- 
petition with the English hat- makers. In conclusion, it should 
be stated that a careful examination of the whole subject does 
not bear out the assertion, which has often been made, that 
Parliament was actuated by a selfish desire to promote the 
interests of subjects of the Crown living in Britain at the cost 
of other subjects living outside of the realm. On the contrary, 
Parliament, at least in the earlier time, attempted to legislate in 
the general interest of all. It would be an interesting inquiry 
whether the present colonial system of Great Britain, in which 
many of the colonies hedge themselves about with protective 
tariffs, is really productive of greater proportional benefit to 
the people of the whole Empire fhan was the colonial system 
of a century and a quarter ago. 

Parliament exercised authority which, constitutionally 
speaking, was unlimited. No man or body of Lim-t t' 
men reviewed its acts. It was supreme in the on Colonial 
State. The colonial assemblies exercised limited overnmen s. 
functions, and their acts were subject to review. The powers of 
the colonial legislatures were restrained by written documents 
— the charters of the chartered and proprietary colonies, and 
the commissions and instructions of the governors of the royal 
provinces. All these instruments emanated from the Crown. 
Furthermore, an appeal lay from the decision of the highest 
court of every colony to the king in Council. The laws of 
all the colonies were liable to be reviewed and annulled by 
the same authority, whenever contrary to act of Parliament. 
Moreover, they must be conformable to the general customs 
and laws of England " so far as the circumstances of the place 
will admit." The issue in each case was determined by the 
king in Council. In the majority of cases, the laws passed by 
the colonial legislatures were regularly sent to England and 
might be disallowed at any time within three years. The king 
frequently exercised his power of veto as to colonial legislation 
C. A. 3 



34 The Colonists, 1760-65. [Chap. 

after the royal veto had become obsolete in Great Britain. 
In this way the colonists became accustomed to government 
resting immediately on written constitutions, to the exercise 
of the veto power, and to the interpretation of their laws and the 
overruling of the decisions of their courts by a judicial body 
in England from whose judgments there was no appeal. In 
these facts can be discerned the sources of several of the most 
important features of the American system of government, as 
elaborated in the constitutions of the United States and of the 
several States. 

The governor of a royal province was the personal repre- 
sentative of the king, and as such he exercised 
The ° 

Provincial such portions of the king's prerogative as he was 

Governor. authorized to exercise by his instructions. For 

example, he summoned, prorogued, and dissolved assemblies 
at his pleasure. Although the laws of England, which were in 
force at the time of the founding of a colony, were held to be 
in force there, subsequent statutes of Parliament did not extend 
to the colonies unless it was so stated in the act. It thus 
happened that in many ways the prerogative was more exten- 
sive as to the colonies than it was with regard to England. 
For instance, the Septennial Act did not extend to America, 
and all attempts on the part of the legislatures of the royal 
provinces to regulate the holding of elections and the duration 
of assemblies and the frequency of sessions had been defeated 
by the use of the veto power. In the chartered colonies, on 
the contrary, annual elections were the rule. 

The royal governor exercised all executive power, except 

as he was limited in his instructions or by 

The Colonial colouial acts which had not been disallowed by 

Legislatures. _ ■' 

the king. He was the head of the colonial 
judiciary, appointing the judges and himself acting as Chief 
Justice of the highest colonial court. He was also commander- 
in-chief of the colonial forces and appointed the more important 



I.] Colonial Governments. 35 

officers. In the chartered colonies, the governor sometimes 
possessed little executive power, or, indeed, power of any kind. 

In Rhode Island he had no more authority than any other 
member of the Board of Assistants over whose deliberations he 
presided. The representative bodies throughout the colonies 
had acquired considerable strength through the exercise of the 
right to levy and apportion the taxes. In Virginia, for example, 
the assembly appointed the treasurer, who at this time was the 
Speaker of the popular branch of the legislature. Throughout 
the colonies, the governors, judges, and other royal officials, 
outside of the customs service, were dependent upon the 
assemblies for the payment of their stipends, which were 
frequently withheld, or voted as the price of some concession 
on the part of the government. The efficacy of this means of 
coercing a governor may be ascertained from the fact that the 
proprietary of Pennsylvania was obliged to put successive 
governors of that colony under bonds to veto legislation con- 
trary to the proprietary's interest. Notwithstanding the great 
authority possessed by the king and Parliament, the people of 
the several colonies substantially governed themselves before 
1760. It was well said that "Grenville lost America because 
he read the despatches, which none of his predecessors had 
done." Occasionally the Bishop of London or some especially 
aggrieved colonist would bring a case before the Privy Council 
or the Board of Trade and thus arouse the interest of a few 
persons in the administration of colonial affairs. But such 
interest was short-lived, and the colonists were soon left to 
settle their affairs in their own way. Had it been otherwise, it 
is improbable that the colonies of Connecticut and Rhode 
Island would have been permitted long to continue in their 
position of partial independence. 

The charters of these two colonies erected the voters of 
those dominions into " corporations upon the place." They 
elected their governors and enacted laws without any reference 

3—2 



36 The Colonists, 1760-65. [Chap. 

to the home government. So liberal were these charters that 
they survived the shock of the Revolution and remained the 

constitutions of the States of Connecticut and 
tered^coion'ies. Rhode Island until 18 18 and 1842 respectively. 

There was no representative of the king in 
either colony, except one or two customs ofificers. The charters 
of these colonies were substantially codifications of the govern- 
ment which existed in Massachusetts at the time they were 
granted (1662 and 1663). The colony charter, under which 
Massachusetts had been founded, was vacated in 1684, and 
was not regranted after the Revolution of 1688. Instead, an 
attempt was made to establish there a government which 
may be described as a compromise between the royal and 
charter forms. By the Massachusetts charter of 1691, the 
governor was to be appointed by the king and to have in 
general the same powers as the royal governors. On the 
other hand, provision was made for a House of Representa- 
tives to be elected on a low property franchise. The Council, 
which advised the governor and formed an upper house of the 
legislature, instead of being appointed by the king, as in the 
royal provinces, was chosen by the House of Representatives, 
subject to the approval of the governor. The salaries of the 
governor and of the judges, who were appointed by him, were 
voted by the Representatives. There was great possibility of 
friction between the representatives of the king and of the 
people. The government had been in operation but a short 
time when disputes began, and they continued with scarcely a 
break until 1774, when the government under the charter was sus- 
pended by act of Parliament. Political warfare breeds politi- 
cians, and the political leaders of Massachusetts, like Samuel 
Adams and John Hancock, may be regarded as the first Ameri- 
can politicians. As a matter of fact, government was so decen- 
tralized in New England that the form of the general government 
was of less importance there than in any of the other colonies. 



I.] Local Government. yj 

The New England town-system was the continuation of 
the old English parish-system before the days 
of closed vestries, while it was yet a popular England town- 
institution. Many changes had been made, of ^y''*^"'- 
course, to adapt the institutions of Elizabethan England to the 
needs of communities living in a wilderness. Strong as was the 
town organization, it was not older than the central governments, 
and it cannot be said that the State was founded on the towns. 
The two developed side by side, the Congregational or Inde- 
pendent method of Church organization, which gave nearly all 
power in religious matters to the local religious bodies, strongly 
influencing the civil organization in the same direction. The 
town became the administrative unit and absorbed a large part 
of the business of the colony. Affairs were discussed and con- 
cluded at a general meeting of all the voters in the town. 
Certain persons were selected to carry on the town's business 
according to instructions given them by the voters in town 
meeting. These selectmen were the agents of the town and 
had such authority as the voters of the town, to whom they 
were directly responsible, might give them and no more. The 
New Englanders, therefore, had a direct personal interest in 
the management of their affairs, and acquired skill in the trans- 
action of political and public business. Where government 
was so decentralized it was difficult to bring about an adminis- 
trative chaos. The dissolution of the legislative body or the 
abdication of a governor were regarded as of little moment. It 
may also be observed that whenever the inhabitants of any con- 
siderable number of these towns were opposed to any measure 
of the central government they could inaugurate a very formid- 
able opposition to the central government without performing 
any act which could be regarded as against the law. 

Outside of New England the local administration was 
organized on a less popular basis. It becomes more and more 
aristocratic and centralized as one proceeds southward, until, 



38 The Colonists, 1760-65. [Chap. 

in South Carolina, local administration is merged in the general 
administration of the colony. In Virginia, for 

Local govern- •' ° ' 

ment in the instance, the functions of local government were 

°"* ■ exercised through the vestries of the parishes 

and through the county courts. The vestries were close 
corporations in 1760, and the members of the county courts 
were appointed by the central government. The parishes and 
the counties were often coterminous, and the members of the 
two governing boards were frequently the same persons. Thus 
the leading men in each county exercised nearly all local power. 
It happened that at the time of the Revolution the leaders 
of Virginian politics and society were the chiefs of the oppo- 
sition to the British government; and, in this way, the local 
institutions of Virginia proved to be a source of strength, 
rather than of weakness, to the American cause. 

The people of the several sections of the English-American 
Plans of colonies were wide apart in their institutional 

Union- and social arrangements in 1760, and their 

material interests were also different. He would have been a 
bold prophet who would have foretold that in six years they 
would voluntarily send delegates to an inter-colonial Congress. 
Many schemes of union had been proposed. Most of them 
had not gone beyond the works of their proposers, and only 
two need be even mentioned. In 1754 delegates from many 
colonies met at Albany in response to the invitation of the 
British Board of Trade. They assembled to discuss and 
arrange means for concerted action against the French, and 
to adopt some common policy towards the Indians. .The 
outcome of their deliberations was the Albany Plan of Union. 
This provided for the appointment of a President-General by 
the king, and for the election of a Grand Council by the 
colonial legislatures. The scheme was rejected by the English 
government, and by the colonial legislatures, on exactly op- 
posite grounds — the one because it was too democratic, the 



I.] Plans of Union. 39 

other because it seemed to increase the power of the Crown. 
From these reasons Dr Franklin, its principal author, con- 
cluded that it must have been a good plan. Another scheme 
proposed during the great war was the work of the Lords of 
Trade, and was known as the Halifax Plan, from the name of the 
chairman of the board. This provided for a military co-opera- 
tion between the governments of the several colonies. It was 
further suggested that each colony's proportion of the necessary 
charges should be ascertained by commissioners, to be appointed 
by the councils and assemblies of the colonies. But nothing 
came of this scheme, and in 1760 there was no bond of union 
between the people of the different colonies save the British 
blood which flowed in the veins of the dominant race and the 
common subordination of all the colonies to the Crown and to 
Parliament. That union for which philosophers and jurists 
had schemed was to be suddenly brought about in a most unex- 
pected manner by the passage of the Stamp Act in 1765. 

The colonists had evinced a determined spirit of in- 
dependence from the outset. In the seventeenth 
century several colonies had refused obedience ences between 
to the representatives of the Crown, and one ^"tain and 

the colonies. 

colony had paid no attention to the decisions of 
the courts at Westminster. The first part of the eighteenth 
century was a period of almost incessant bickering and petty 
strife between the representatives of the British government 
on the one hand and the popular branches of the colonial 
legislatures on the other hand. These disputes were usually 
confined to local politics; they never assumed the form of a 
combination between two or more colonies to resist the 
authority of Great Britain. 

During the French and Indian War these altercations 
threatened to assume a more serious aspect „. 

^ Change in 

owing to the attempts of British officials to colonial 
enforce obedience to acts of Parliament as to ^° "^^" 



40 The Colonists, 1760-65. [Chap. i. 

billeting of soldiers and, also, to the supersession of colonial 
military officers by those holding commissions direct from the 
Crown. That these disputes led to no graver results must be 
attributed to the laissez-faitr administrative policy of Sir Robert 
Walpole and his immediate successors. Had that policy been 
maintained after 1760, there is little reason to believe that the 
conquest of Canada and the existence of the Navigation Laws 
and Acts of Trade would have led to rebellion. Lord Mahon 
was undoubtedly right in saying that, had not some new cause 
of complaint arisen, the colonial agents, even in his day, 
might still have been debating at Whitehall. It was not so to 
be. The wise counsels of the earlier time were thrown to 
the winds. The British government, by enforcing the Acts 
of Trade and by levying taxes on the colonies by acts of 
Parliament, compelled the colonists to combine in defence of 
what they considered to be their rights, and thus prepared 
the way to revolution and independence. 



CHAPTER II. 

CONSTITUTIONAL OPPOSITION, I76O-74. 

The campaigns of the Seven Years' War in Europe and in 
America were sustained at great cost by the 
British government and the American colonists. T.^^ "^^ 

° policy begun. 

The Imperial public debt, if such an expression 
may be permitted, increased by leaps and bounds. Seeking 
to augment the revenue by all reasonable means, the British 
government examined the administration of the Acts of Trade, 
and discovered, to its amazement, that those acts in some 
colonies were not enforced at all. It also seemed plain that 
many New England merchants, unmindful of their duty to their 
country, had supplied the French posts on the seaboard with 
provisions. Orders were at once issued to enforce the Acts of 
Trade, and a stimulus was thus given to the customs officers 
in Massachusetts, who seem to have been very corrupt, to 
endeavour to conceal their past misconduct by a display of 
unwonted energy. 

Evasion of the Acts of Trade prevailed to such an extent 
and was practised so openly that it seems a misnomer to 
term it smuggling. No one had ever thought much about the 
constitutionality of the acts because, with the collusion of 

41 



42 Constitutional Opposition, 1760-74. [Chap. 

the customs ofificers, it had been easy to evade them. The 
enforcement of the acts at once showed the difficulty of 
carrying out laws opposed by a whole people. Arming the 
customs ofificers with special search-warrants 
sistance °i76i^' provcd to be of little use. Such warrants con- 
tained the name of the informer, and were re- 
turnable. In this way the informer became known to the 
community, and in a time of excitement he and other in- 
formers were almost certain to be intimidated into silence. 
The search-warrant also contained a description of the place 
where the un-customed goods were deposited, and covered 
only the seizure of merchandise in the designated place. 
When an officer, supplied with one of these warrants, reached 
the designated place, it might well happen that the last 
barrel of un-customed sugar was being rolled through the. 
door of a warehouse on the opposite side of the street, or 
even through a door into a store beside the one he was 
authorized to search. Under these circumstances, the customs 
officials were practically powerless. They had recourse to 
g enera l search-warrants or Writs of Assistance, as they were 
usually termed. These were first issued, in this connection, by 
Governor Shirley of Massachusetts, who certainly had no legal 
power to issue them. The ofificers, therefore, were directed to 
apply to the Superior Court for new writs. This they did in 
1 761. James Otis, the king's Advocate, resigned his office to 
argue against their issuance. Hutchinson, the historian of 
Massachusetts, who was then Chief-Justice, asserts that Otis 
took this course from pique because his father had not been 
appointed to the chief-justiceship. There is absolutely no 
proof of this. Hutchinson had the misfortune to be on bad 
terms with both James Otis and Samuel Adams, but there is no 
more reason for attributing evil motives to them than to him. 
It is no doubt true that Otis rejoiced in this, and in other oppor- 
tunities, to heap unpopularity on a personal enemy. Otis on 



IT.] Writs of Assistance, \y6i. 43 

this occasion made an epoch-marking speecb, which is con- 
veniently regarded as the first act in the American Revolution. 
Unfortunately it has come down to us only in the fragmentary 
form of notes taken by John Adams, then a young Boston 
lawyer. 

Conscious that the law was against him, Otis based his 
argument on the broader ground of the rights of 
the colonists as Englishmen. He declared that J^^^es otis's 

° argument. 

the use of writs of assistance was an act of 
tyranny, similar to the abuse of power which had "cost one 
king of England his head, another his throne." He concluded 
with the assertion, based on a reading of Coke and the other 
earlier law writers, that Parliament could not legalize the 
exercise of an act of tyranny such as must be the every-day 
consequence of the use of writs of assistance, for "an act of 
Parliament against the constitution is void." This idea was a 
favourite one with Otis. He elaborated it a few years later 
(1764) in his essay entitled The Rights of the Colonies 
Asse?'ted and Proved. In that paper he uses these words : 

" Parliament cannot make two and two, five Parliaments 

are in all cases to declare what is for the good of the whole; 
but it is not the declaration of Parliament that makes it so. 
There must be in every instance a higher authority, God. 
Should an act of Parliament be against any of His natural laws, 
which are immutably true, their declaration would be contrary 
to eternal ti-uth, equity, and justice, and consequently void." 
The writs of assistance were granted by the Court some months 
later, and were declared legal by Parliament in one of the 
Townshend Acts (1767). Otis's argument, however, even in 
the imperfect form in which it was reported, penetrated ere 
long to the hearts of the American people. Such writs are 
forbidden in every State constitution of the revolutionary 
period, and in one of the first amendments to the Constitution 
of the United States. Nevertheless, it must be admitted that 



44 Constitutional Opposition, 1760-74. [Chap. 

Otis was wrong and that Hutchinson and the other judges were 
legally right; that Parliament had the legal and constitutional 
right to provide for the issuance of such writs; and that the 
only remedy then in the hands of the colonists was revolu- 
tion. 

This dispute had hardly subsided when Otis involved him- 
^. self in another as the champion of the constitu- 

Dispute as to '- 

the "control tional power of the House of Representatives 
of the purse. against the encroachments of the executive. 
Toward the end of 1761, Governor Bernard of Massachusetts, 
acting with the advice of his Council, and for what seems to 
have been a good reason, expended a small sum of money in 
fitting out the provincial armed sloop for the protection of 
vessels on the northern coasts against French privateers. The 
money so expended was then in the colonial treasury, but had 
not been appropriated to this purpose by vote of the House of 
Representatives. This action, unimportant in itself, was re- 
garded as a most dangerous precedent, as it was argued that if 
the Governor could legally arm one soldier or sailor he could 
arm one thousand or ten thousand. Led by Otis, the House 
remonstrated against the act as depriving them of " their most 
darling privilege, the right of originating all taxes." The 
Governor, aware of the impropriety of his act, was not disposed 
to stand by it, and the matter would have stopped at that point 
had not Otis, in the remonstrance voted by the House, made 
the further statement " that it would be of little consequence 
to the people whether they were subject to George or Louis, 
the king of Great Britain or the French king, if both were 
arbitrary, as both would be, if both could levy taxes without 
parliament." To this Bernard objected most strenuously, and 
the phrase was erased'by order of the House. In justification 
of his action, Otis wrote the earliest political pamphlet of the 
Revolution, entitled A Vindication of tlie House of Repre- 
sentatives. The political theories adduced in this tract may 



II.] Otis' s Political Pamphlets. 45 

be regarded as the first statement of the theory of government 
maintained by the leaders in that movement. 

Otis' s argument was, to a great extent, a mere restatement 
of the ground taken by Locke in his Essay on 
Government. Among other things, Otis declared can'^th^'ry."" 
that "God made all men naturally equal" and 
that "ideas of pre-eminence are acquired." Two years later 
(1764), in his long essay, which has been already mentioned, 
he asserted that men are naturally equal and that government 
is founded on the necessities of our nature. Government is 
described as being in the nature of a thing given in trust for the 
good of mankind, eachsocietybeingat liberty to establish such 
a form as might seem to it best. If a government were un- 
faithful to its trust, it should be opposed. Otis admitted that 
it was difficult to arrange for the carrying of the laws of Nature 
into effect. He regarded the British constitution as the 
most perfect arrangement for this purpose that had yet been 
devised. As to the rights of the colonists he declared that as 
men they have the same rights as other men, " the common 
children of the same Creator with their brethren in Great 
Britain. Nature has placed all such in a state of equality and 
perfect freedom." "Every British subject, born on the con- 
tinent of America, is, by the laws of God and Nature, by the 
Common Law, and by Act of Parliament entitled to all the 
natural, inherent, and inseparable rights of our fellow subjects 
in Great Britain." Among these rights was one by which a man 
could not be deprived of his property without his consent in 
person or by representative. He also asserted that there was 
no ground for a distinction between external and internal taxa- 
tion. Otis' s premises pointed in one direction and in one 
direction alone — revolution. But so great was his regard for 
the British constitution that he could not bring himself to state 
the logical conclusion from his argument, and ended his essay 
by asserting that the colonists were only entitled to subordinate 



46 Constitutional Opposition, 1760-74. [Chap. 

legislatures and that Parliament was supreme over all. It was 
thus given to another lawyer to state the American political 
theory in a more complete form. 

Otis made his speech against writs of assistance in 1761. 
p . Some two years later, Patrick Henry of Virginia 

Henry's Stated the Opinions of a large portion of the 

^^^^"^ ■ people of Virginia as well as of the other col- 

onies as to the exercise of the veto power by the king. The 
case is always cited as the "Parson's Cause," because it arose 
from the attempt of a Virginia clergyman to obtain money due 
to him under the law of Virginia as it stood and not as it would 
have been had the king allowed an act of the Virginia legislat- 
ure to become law. Into the technicalities or, indeed, into 
the moralities of the case, it is not necessary to enter here. 
The Court had decided that the clergyman could recover, and 
the question before the jury was as to the amount. Patrick 
Henry was at that time an industrious young lawyer. He 
was of good British stock, partly English but more especially 
Scottish. He had received a good education for a man of his 
time and place; he had studied Greek, could read Latin with 
some ease, and was very familiar with the history and theory of 
the British constitution. This was his first appearance in any 
important cause calling for the display of oratory. Brushing 
aside the technicalities of the case, he denied the power of the 
king to veto an act of the Virginia Legislature passed for the 
good of the people of Virginia. "Government," he asserted, 
" was a conditional compact between the king, stipulating 
protection on the one hand, and the people, stipulating obedi- 
ence and support on the other." A violation of these covenants 
by either party discharged the other party from its obligations. 
The act in question was a good act and its disallowance by the 
king an instance of misrule and neglect which made it necessary 
that the people of Virginia should provide for their own safety. 
The king from being a father of his people had " degenerated 



II.] The Parson's Cause. 47 

into a tyrant and forfeited all right to his subjects' obedience." 
He told the jurors that, under the ruling of the Court, they 
must award damages, but that an award of one farthing would 
satisfy the law. They awarded one penny. In these two 
cases, Otis and Henry, between them, had cast a serious 
shadow on the authority of Parliament and on the prerogatives 
of the king. Nevertheless these were isolated outbreaks. They 
were the result, in each case, of peculiar local conditions. 
They attracted little attention in the colonies at the time, and, 
what was extraordinary, the English government gave way in 
the Virginia case. There seems every reason to believe that 
at the beginning of 1764 no more loyal and faithful subjects 
could be found than the American colonists. In November, 
1765, they were in open rebellion from the Penobscot to the 
Altamaha. This change of sentiment was caused wholly by 
an attempt to tax them by acts passed by the Parliament of 
Great Britain. 

The position in which the British government found itself 
at the close of the war was a most difficult one. 

Conspiracy 

This much must be conceded at the outset. The of Pontiac, 
public debt had increased, and there seemed to ^^ ^' 
be no end to the expenses to be ^incurred in America. The 
newly-conquered territory required a large body of troops to 
hold the hostile population in subjection. The Indians on the 
frontier, under the leadership of an able chieftain, Pontiac, and 
inspired by designing, or, perhaps, merely ill-informed French 
traders, burst into open revolt. The only way to establish the 
English supremacy was to crush them. The colonists on their 
part evinced little disposition to aid the authorities with colo- 
nial troops. They were still more unwilling to contribute to the 
support of the soldiers of the regular army, sent over for what 
the English government declared to be their protection. They 
felt able to take care of themselves, and doubted the necessity 
for much of the protection it was proposed to give them. 



48 Constitutional Opposition, 1760-74. [Chap. 

Besides, the colonists living in the different sections were very 
jealous of one another. The northern colonists felt that the 
southerners had not done their share in the late war. They 
were in no haste to hurry to their defence, nor were they willing 
to contribute money to fortify the southern frontiers. British 
expediency, or better, perhaps, political wisdom, demanded 
that such sectional feelings should be encouraged. Further- 
more, it would be much better to gain what might be gained 
from the prosperity of the colonists in an indirect way, even 
at some cost in men and money, than, by an exercise of power, 
to unite the northern and southern colonies in opposition to 
the British government. This latter, however, was precisely 
what that government did. 

The Pitt-Newcastle Ministry was no longer in power. Mr 
.„ , George Grenville was now at the head of the 

Grenville s ° 

colonial policy, government. Of Grenville 's honesty and good 
^•^ ^" ^' intentions there cannot be the slightest doubt. 

He was an over-zealous, well-meaning, but narrow-minded 
lawyer. He saw that the colonists habitually refused to obey 
the trade laws, and also that they declined to take an effective 
part in what his military advisers declared to be necessary 
measures for their own security, and for the best interests of 
the Empire. He determined in the first place to lower the 
prohibitory duties on sugar and molasses, and then to enforce 
the acts, using the naval power of England if necessary. This 
new policy was begun in 1763. It affected directly the com- 
mercial interests of New England and aroused great ill-feeling 
there, especially in Massachusetts. The attempt to secure 
funds toward the support of the regular troops led to the 
passage of the Stamp Act, which affected all the colonies. 

On the gth of March, 1764, Mr Grenville, in opening the 
budget of the year, stated that it might be thought proper for 
the colonists to contribute towards the support of the army 
stationed among them for their protection. He therefore pro- 



ir.] The Stamp Act, 1^6$. 49 

posed a resolution that it might "be necessary to charge 
certain stamp duties in America." He had 

Passage of 

already informed the colonial agents of his in- the stamp Act, 
tention to bring forward this motion, and had ^^^^' 
directed them to consult their principals with a view to having 
the colonists themselves propose some more agreeable method 
of raising the necessary revenue. The resolution was passed 
without debate or opposition. Mr Grenville then suggested to 
the colonial agents that the colonial assemblies, by agreeing to 
this resolution before the final passing of the act, would thereby 
establish a precedent for being consulted in the future — or, he 
added, perhaps the assemblies might propose some other mode 
of being taxed by Parliament. Ample time was given them to 
formulate their wishes. Instead of so doing, the colonists pro- 
tested in vigorous and well-considered language against being 
taxed at all by Parliament. But their petitions were not even 
received by the House of Commons, in conformity to "a 
monstrous rule," as Lord Farnborough terms" it, which forbade 
petitioning against certain money bills. ^ The act levying 
stamp duties passed the Commons in March, 1765, without any 
considerable debate and with only fifty votes in the negative, 
and received the royal assent. The king, at the moment, 
was suffering from his first attack of mental disorder, and the 
royal assent was given by commission. The colonial agents, 
many of whom were Americans, believing the act would be 
peacefully carried out, secured the places of stamp distributers 
for themselves and their friends. 

The Stamp Act, in itself, was a fair and equitable measure. 
In its essential features it was not unlike a 
Stamp Act passed by the Massachusetts legis- ^J^^ stamp 
lature in 1755. No duty was levied on the 
ordinary papers of exchange nor on receipts for money paid. 

1 May, Constitutional History (edition of 1873), ^^^' 347i ^^d note I to 
p. 348. 

C. A. 4 



50 Constitutional Opposition, 1760-74. [Chap. 

The money raised under the act was to be expended in 
America and not drawn to England. The only evil feature of 
the act, as a law, was the clause which provided that, at the 
discretion of the prosecuting officer, any case arising under 
it should be tried in the Admiralty Courts without a jury. 
The news of its passage reached America early in April. 
But except for the spiking of the guns in a fort near Phila- 
delphia, there was no demonstration of any moment until 
the end of May. Many historians have urged this as a proof 
that the act would have quietly gone into effect but for the 
impulse given to agitation by one fiery spirit. This view does 
not seem to be well founded. The quiet was rather of that 
sort which precedes a storm. There was no tangible issue to 
contest. When such an issue should arise there surely would, 
be an explosion. It chanced, however, that the matter did 
not rest until the day canae for buying stamps. 

Patrick Henry had been returned to fill a vacancy in the 

House of Burgesses, as the popular branch of 

Henry's Res- t}^g Virginia legislature was called. It was his 

olutions, 1765. ... ,.,.,. J 

first term of service m any legislative body, and 
the Burgesses were mainly conservative men of property whose 
minds, at this time, were fully occupied with an important 
question of colonial politics. As none of these men proposed 
to protest against the Stamp Act, Henry, on the next to the 
last day of the session (May 29, 1765), offered certain resolu- 
tions which he forced through by dint of his matchless oratory. 
There has been some confusion as to the precise form in which 
the resolutions passed. This was due partly to the fact that 
on the next day, after Henry had left, the Conservatives 
repealed the boldest of them. The whole set, preamble and 
all, had been sent off to the north and south almost as soon as 
written. They were printed everywhere as the Virginia Reso- 
lutions, and are here given entire from a manuscript copy 
left by Henry : 



ir.] Henrys Resolutions, 1765. 5 1 

"Whereas, The Honourable House of Commons, in 
England, have of late drawn into question how far the General 
Assembly of this colony hath power to enact laws for laying of 
taxes and imposing duties payable by the people of this his 
Majesty's most ancient colony; for settling and ascertaining the 
same to all future times, the House of Burgesses of this present 
General Assembly have come to the following resolves : — 

" Resolved, That the first adventurers, settlers of this his 
Majesty's colony and dominion of Virginia, brought with them 
and transmitted to their posterity, and all other his Majesty's 
subjects, since inhabiting in this his Majesty's colony, all the 
privileges and immunities that have at any time been held, 
enjoyed, and possessed by the people of Great Britain. 

" Resolved, That by two royal charters, granted by King 
James the First, the colonists aforesaid are declared and 
entitled to all privileges and immunities of natural-born sub- 
jects, to all intents and purposes as if they had been abiding 
and born within the realm of England. 

"Resolved, That his Majesty's liege people of this his 
ancient colony have enjoyed the right of being thus governed 
by their own Assembly in the article of taxes and internal 
police, and that the same have never been forfeited, or any 
other way yielded up, but have been constantly recognized by 
the King and people of Great Britain. 

" Resolved, Therefore, that the General Assembly of this 
colony, together with his Majesty or his substitutes, have, in 
their representative capacity, the only exclusive right and 
power to lay taxes and imposts upon the inhabitants of this 
colony; and that every attempt to vest such power in any 
other person or persons whatever than the General Assembly 
aforesaid, is illegal, unconstitutional, and unjust, and has a 
manifest tendency to destroy British as well as American liberty. 

" Resolved, That his Majesty's liege people, the inhabitants 
of this colony, are not bound to yield obedience to any law 

4—2 



52 Constitittional Opposition, 1760-74. [Chap. 

or ordinance whatever, designed to impose any taxation what- 
soever upon them, other than the laws or ordinances of the 
General Assembly aforesaid. 

" Resolved, That any person who shall, by speaking or 
writing, assert or maintain that any person or persons, other 
than the General Assembly of this colony, have any right or 
power to impose or lay any taxation on the people here, shall 
be deemed an enemy to his Majesty's colony." 

These resolutions are given in full partly to show the legal 
phraseology in which the leaders of the Revolution were 
accustomed to clothe their State papers; but more especially 
to show the bold and unhesitating language with which Henry 
was wont to treat any subject. At first they were passed 
around from hand to hand. Later on they were printed in 
the newspapers; but it was not until July that they were 
generally known throughout the colonies. 

Meantime, on June 6th, before the Virginia Resolves were 
known at Boston, Otis had introduced and pushed 

Stamp Act ' ' 

Congress through a reluctant House of Representatives a 

'^^^^^^- call for a general meeting of committees from all 

the continental assemblies in a Congress to secure united 
action in regard to the Stamp Act. The party opposed to 
agitation was in the majority in the Massachusetts House of 
Representatives, and two conservative members were joined 
with Otis to form the Massachusetts committee. The response 
to this proposition was at first not at all favourable. Henry's 
resolutions, however, had formulated the opinion of the people 
at large. One assembly after another accepted the invitation 
of Massachusetts until all which were in session, except that 
of New Hampshire, had chosen committees. 

In August, the names of the stamp distributers were made 
public. Then at last an issue was raised. Riots occurred 
in New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, 



II.] TJie Stamp Act, 1765. 53 

Pennsylvania, and Rhode Island. The Boston riots were the 

most serious of all. There the resentment of 

the mob was directed against the customs ofificials . '^^^ stamp 

. , T ., Act disobeyed. 

as well as against the stamp distributer. Much 
damage was done to property, and the whole affair was dis- 
graceful. Before long, every stamp distributer had resigned. 
As the stamped paper and the stamps arrived at the several 
ports, they were stored in the forts or oftentimes on vessels in 
the harbours. November ist arrived, the day on which the act 
was to come into force. Not a stamp could be bought. There 
was no one in America authorized either to open the packages 
of stamped paper or to sell stamps. In the condition of temper 
then prevailing among the people, no royal official seemed 
disposed to stretch a point to get the stamps into circulation. 
Soon the royal officials were themselves obliged to violate the 
act and to clear vessels without using stamped paper — though 
such clearances were plainly illegal. A few clearances on 
stamped paper issued by the collector at Savannah, Georgia, were 
the only instances in which the act was observed. The judges 
were obliged, after a brief period of waiting, to open the courts 
regardless of the law. In one case, a cler^ of the court, who re- 
fused to use unstamped paper, was threatened by the judge with 
confinement for contempt of court if he persisted in his refusal. 
The newspapers appeared with a death's head or some ingenious 
device in the corner where the stamp should have been. In the 
case of probate business alone does there seem to have been any 
appreciable inconvenience from the refusal to use the stamps. 
The Stamp Act Congress met at New York on October 7th. 
It formulated a Declaration of Rights, on the lines 
of the Virginia Resolutions, and petitions to _ ^"^^""p ^'^^ 

° ' '■ Congress, 1765. 

the king and to the two Houses of Parliament. 
The importance of the Stamp Act Congress consists not so 
much in what it performed as in the fact of its existence. For 
years the English government had sought in vain to bring the 



54 Constitutional Opposition, 1760-74. [Chap. 

colonies into some kind of union against the French. Now, in 
one moment, of their own motion, they came together. The 
Stamp Act Congress, therefore, marks the beginning of the 
American Union. Moreover the leaders of the radical party 
in the several colonies there represented came together and ex- 
changed ideas. For the first time the men of the Revolution 
met each other face to face. Virginia was not represented, 
owing to the impossibility of electing a committee; and Otis 
and Henry, the two men who gave the first impulse to revolu- 
tion, probably never met. 

The king before this had dismissed the Grenville Ministry 

for personal reasons. After some attempts to 

English secure the services of Pitt, he was obliged to 

Politics. ' ° 

confide the government to the section of the 
Whig party, which might well have been called the Regular 
Whigs, led by the Marquis of Rockingham, of the great house 
of Wentworth, whom the king had treated with ignominy a 
short time before. The ministry, possessing neither the con- 
fidence nor the goodwill of the monarch, nor any inherent 
strength of its own, immediately found itself face to face with a 
serious crisis in the affairs of the Empire. Curiously enough 
the Stamp tax, which had been chosen on account of what 
might be called its self-enforcing qualities, was in the existing 
state of the public mind in America almost incapable of en- 
forcement — a whole people could not be compelled to go to 
law, nor could the colonists be obliged to make wills or read 
newspapers. They might dispose of their property before death 
and might read news-letters instead of stamped printed sheets. 
They certainly could not be forced to buy stamps without the 
presence of an army; and the ministers must have paid some 
slight heed to Franklin's remark to the effect that an army 
sent to America would find no rebellion prevailing there but 
might indeed make one. There could be no hope from 
modification of the law, as the act in its present shape could be 



II.] Repeal of the Stamp Act, lyGG. 55 

carried out as easily as any modified act could be. Repeal 
and enforcement, therefore, were the only alternatives, and 
everything pointed toward repeal. 

In the eyes of the ministry the act was the work of their 
predecessors in ofifice who would be discredited „ , , ^ 

^ Repeal of the 

by repeal. Pitt was still the " Great Com- stamp Act, 
moner," and his speech advocating repeal de- ^^^^' 
cided the matter. He sought to elaborate a theory drawing a 
distinction between the power to tax and the general legislative 
power. On the face of it there seemed to be some ground for 
this distinction. The preamble of the Stamp Act itself seemed 

to carry its own condemnation: "We, your Majesty's 

subjects, the Commons of Great Britain give " the prop- 
erty of other subjects living in America. Pitt maintained that 
Parliament was the supreme legislative body and might raise 
a revenue from the colonies by means of imposts; as such a 
tax would be an external tax. In this view, the majority of 
the colonists would probably have concurred, with the ex- 
ception, perhaps, that they might have maintained that only 
such duties as were incidental to the regulation of commerce 
could be raised by Parliament. But up to that time there had 
been no general denial of the legislative supremacy of Parlia- 
ment. Otis had expressly acknowledged it. Acting on Pitt's 
suggestion, the ministry introduced two bills — one repealing 
the Stamp Act, the other declaring the legislative supremacy of 
Parliament. Both were passed (1766) notwithstanding very 
able speeches made by Lord Mansfield in the Peers and by 
Grenville in the Commons against the repeal of the Stamp 
Act. Looking backward, it is now clear that Pitt and Lord 
Camden were wrong; that the law was best expounded by 
Lord Mansfield and George Grenville; and that the Stamp 
Act was constitutional. Certainly it was not expedient. But 
here, as in the case of writs of assistance and the exercise of 
the veto power, the only remedy in the hands of the colonists 



56 Constitutional Oppositioji, 1760-74. [Chap. 

was revolution. At the time, liowever, the colonists paid little 
heed to the Declaratory Act or foresaw that it would lead to 
another tax. They rejoiced only over the repeal of the Stamp 
Act. 

The same year (1766) witnessed the downfall of the 
^ ^ J, Rockingham Ministry and the accession of Pitt 

Townshend s ° -' 

Colonial to powcr at the head of a government comprising 

''° "^^' representatives of several groups and hence 

derisively dubbed by Edmund Burke the "Mosaic Ministry." 
Mr Pitt was no longer in the Commons, but had been raised 
to the peerage as the Earl of Chatham. As he was in feeble 
health, the Duke of Grafton, a man of slight force, was the 
nominal Prime Minister. Lord Chatham retired at once to the 
country, suffering from some mysterious malady, which seems 
to have been not unlike the "nervous prostration" of the 
present day. His controlling hand withdrawn, the ministry 
soon resolved itself into its component parts. The Chancellor 
of the Exchequer was Charles Townshend, a man of ability, 
though lacking force and steadfastness of purpose. He had been 
in office, with the exception of five years, since 1743. He had 
advocated the right of Parliament to tax the colonies, and had 
voted for the repeal of the Stamp Act solely on grounds of 
expediency. He now determined to raise a revenue by means 
of taxes to be levied by act of Parliament on goods imported 
into the colonies, the taxes to be paid at the time and place of 
importation. This would result in raising a very dangerous 
question and in opening a dispute which might well have been 
avoided. The colonists did not deny the power of Parliament 
to regulate commerce, nor did they refuse to pay duties inci- 
dental thereto, like the tax of one penny per pound on all 
tobacco exported from Virginia. But the only act under 
which the question of raising a revenue from imports had 
arisen was the Sugar Act. That had only recently been 
executed with vigour, and it bore hard on New England alone. 



II.] The ToivnsJiend Acts, \']6'j. 57 

Moreover, there were still great difficulties in the way of 
enforcing it. The judges were dependent on the colonial 
legislatures for their salaries, and there were then no exchequer 
courts in the colonies. The colonial juries would not convict 
for alleged breaches of the revenue laws, if they could possibly 
avoid it. Furthermore, the English Commissioners of the 
Customs found it practically impossible to exercise adequate 
supervision over the American customs officials three thousand 
miles away. Mr Townshend determined to reform all these 
evils, as he regarded them, at the same time that he imposed 
new taxes. It was provided, therefore, in the Townshend 
Acts (1767) that a Board of Commissioners resident in the 
colonies should have charge of the American customs service; 
that cases arising under the revenue Acts should be tried in the 
Admiralty Courts — without juries; and that the salaries of the 
colonial judges and other royal ofificials should be paid out of 
the proceeds of the new duties. Writs of assistance were also 
declared by Parliament to be legal. At about the same time 
Parliament suspended the functions of the Assembly of New 
York, which had refused to make certain appropriations re- 
quired by an act of Parliament. Thus at one moment several 
distinct issues were raised, namely: the constitutional relations 
of Parliament to the colonial legislatures, the right of trial by 
jury, the control of the judiciary and executive, the legality of 
writs of assistance, and the right of Parliament to tax goods 
imported into the colonies. It is extraordinary that a man 
who voted for the repeal of the Stamp Act on the ground of 
expediency should within two years have inaugurated a new 
policy whose inexpediency was manifest. Mr Townshend 
died shortly after the passage of these acts, and it is not im- 
possible that disease may have already unsettled an otherwise 
brilliant intellect. 

The Massachusetts House of Representatives took imme- 
diate notice of these acts, which indeed bore with greater 



58 Constitictional Opposition, 1760-74. [Chap. 

severity on the merchants of New England than on the traders 
_, -. of any other section. In the winter of 1767-68, 

The Massa- -' i i i 

chusetts cir- the Representatives drew up several letters and 
petitions. Among these papers was a Circular 
Letter to be signed by the Speaker and sent to the other 
assemblies, notifying them of the action of Massachusetts and 
suggesting concerted measures. In this letter a desire for 
independence was expressly disavowed. Probably this sen- 
tence attracted the attention of the English government, which 
might well have been alarmed at the necessity for such 
a disavowal. At all events, the Secretary of State for the 
Colonies wrote to Governor Bernard of Massachusetts, com- 
manding him to order the legislature to rescind the letter 
under pain of dissolution in case of refusal. At the same time, 
letters were sent to the governors of the other colonies, directing 
them to dissolve the assemblies of their respective colonies in 
case they acted on the Circular Letter. It is difficult to con- 
ceive the state of ignorance of colonial society which prompted 
these orders. In England a dissolution of Parliament was 
dreaded by the members of a newly-elected House of Commons, 
as a re-election often occasioned considerable expense and 
was always attended with inconvenience. In the colonies, the 
case was very different. The members of the radical party 
welcomed a new election, as it gave them an opportunity to go 
home, consult their constituents, and return to the seat of 
government with a fresh mandate and probably in increased 
numbers, at little or no expense to themselves. The Massa- 
chusetts House of Representatives refused to rescind the 
Circular Letter. The other assemblies hastened to make the 
cause of Massachusetts their own. 

Another cause for discontent was now added to those noted 
^^ ,,. . . above. According to an act passed in the time 

The Virginia ° ^ 

Resolves of of Henry the Eighth, long before the days of 

'^ ^' colonization, an English subject accused of 



II.] The Virginia Resolves, 1769. 59 

crimes committed outside the realm could be tried and punished 
in England. Both Houses of Parliament now presented an 
address to the king, praying that persons charged with treason 
committed in the colonies might be brought to England for 
trial. The Virginia Assembly met May nth, 1769. It was 
now in the hands of the radical party, or rather the con- 
servative element in Virginia had been largely converted to 
radicalism, and the leading men of property were now generally 
on the side of the maintenance of colonial rights against the 
English government. Five days after its meeting, the House 
of Burgesses adopted a set of resolutions known as the Virginia 
Resolves, setting forth the colonial contention on the questions 
at issue in the clearest and most outspoken language.-' Another 
resolution directed the Speaker to send copies of these Resolves 
to the several colonial legislatures on the continent, requesting 
their concurrence therein. This was generally given — some 
assemblies using the language of the Virginia Resolves. 

The moment that Governor Botetourt of Virginia was 
advised of the action of the Burgesses, he dis- 
solved the assembly. But the Burgesses met in tation Agree- 
a neighbouring house and signed an agreement ™^" ^' 
binding thenaselves not to import or use any goods taxed by 
Parliament until the obnoxious laws should be repealed. This 
agreement was drawn by George Mason, later the draftsman 
of the Virginia Bill of Rights, and was presented to the meeting 
by George Washington, already well known in the colonies as 
a soldier and one of the wealthiest men in Virginia, and, 
indeed, in America. There had been non-importation agree- 
ments at the time of the Stamp Act. But now the move- 
ment became general. Before the end of the year, all the 
colonies adopted similar agreements. The object of this 
non-importation policy was to put pressure on the English 
merchants engaged in the American trade, and it was suc- 

1 See Appendix I. 



6o ConstiUitional Opposition, i'/6o-y4. [Chap. 

cessful. The Townshend duties had produced in one year the 
net sum of two hundred and ninety-five pounds sterling. 
During the same time no less than one hundred and seventy 
thousand pounds had been expended in military charges made 
necessary by the disorders consequent on the Townshend Acts 
and the attempt to prevent inter-colonial action. A portion 
of the ministry, led by Lord North, Townshend's successor as 
Chancellor of the Exchequer, opposed the entire repeal of the 
act levying duties. By a majority of one, it was determined to 
retain the tax on tea, which had produced the preceding year a 
gross revenue of three hundred pounds. It is well ascertained 
that Lord North acted under the direction of the king, and 
also that the argument which influenced the king was the 
advisability of establishing a precedent. The other duties 
were abolished. 

During these years (1763-70) the English government 
never seems to have counted the cost of receding 

Inexpediency '-' 

of the English from positions once taken; nor to have realized 
^°'"^^' the fact that if concessions were made they 

should have been made in such a manner as would have put an 
end to the dispute. The colonists, like other men in other 
countries and epochs, objected to paying mone.y to any tax- 
gatherer — that at once will be admitted. But in this question, 
they objected not so much to paying money as to paying 
money which they felt was illegally levied. If it was important 
from the point of view of the English government to retain the 
tax on tea as a species of continuing declaratory act, it was 
equally important for the colonists to pay no tax which could 
be drawn into precedent. They drank smuggled tea sold at a 
low rate by the Dutch West India Company, because it was 
cheap. Tea, therefore, was the best article the government 
could have chosen for their purpose, because so long as the 
tax was not paid it attracted little attention. Possibly this 
tax might have developed quietly into a precedent had not 



II.] The Boston Massacre, 1770. 61 

its existence been brought prominently to the notice of the 
colonists. 

The partial repeal of the Townshend duties took place in 
April, 1770. In the preceding March, an affray , 
known as the " Boston Massacre " had very greatly Massacre," 
complicated the situation, although the news of '^^*'' 
the disturbance had not reached England at the time of the 
repeal. This unfortunate affair resulted in the killing of several 
men and the wounding of several more by British soldiers, 
acting under strong provocation, in one of the most im- 
portant streets in Boston. A few soldiers belonging to the 
regular army had been ordered to Boston in 1766. The 
Board of Commissioners appointed under the Townshend Acts 
established their head-quarters at the same place, where they 
were certain to be opposed in every possible manner. They 
might have entered upon their duties at one of the ports of 
the Middle Colonies with much greater convenience to the 
service and with no danger to themselves. The point now 
under discussion has nothing to do with the rightfulness or 
otherwise of the Acts of Trade. The government having 
undertaken to enforce them should not have placed its agents 
without adequate protection among the people most likely to 
resist them in the discharge of their functions. The seizure of 
the sloop Liberty, owned by John Hancock, a wealthy merchant 
and very popular man, brought on the Commissioners the 
anger of the mob. They fled to a fort in the harbour and 
demanded more troops and a large naval force for their pro- 
tection. The soldiers sent in these circumstances were re- 
garded as aliens and enemies by the people of Massachusetts. 
The officers were treated as outcasts and frowned upon by 
what is known as "society." Early in 1770, blood was shed 
in an attempt by a party from the Rose frigate to impress seamen 
from a colonial vessel. Later, a boy had been accidentally 
killed in the streets of Boston. The " massacre " of March, 1770, 



62 Constitutional Opposition, 1760-74. [Chap. 

was brought on by a personal dispute between some soldiers and 
labourers. In the beginning, it had no connection with taxa- 
tion or the rights of the colonies. As soon as the "massacre " 
became known, it was at once evident that a very serious crisis 
had arisen. In the temper then prevailing, the troops must be 
removed or they would be slaughtered to a man, and an armed 
conflict with the mother country precipitated. Samuel Adams 
stated the facts to the Lieutenant-Governor, Hutchinson, who 
in the absence of Bernard acted as Governor, and later was ap- 
pointed Governor. Hutchinson tried to temporize and offered 
to remove a part of the troops. But Adams replied that if he 
could order one regiment away he could send all, and all the 
soldiers were removed from the town. The officers and men 
present at the time of the firing were tried on a charge of 
murder. They were defended by John Adams and Josiah 
Quincy, two leading patriots, and acquitted by a jury of 
colonists. Two soldiers were convicted of manslaughter and 
slightly branded. After the lapse of more than a century, the 
historical student feels impelled to bear witness to the general 
good behaviour of the soldiers under trying circumstances, and 
to the sense of justice exhibited by the jurymen at the trial. 
The anniversary of the "massacre" was celebrated until after 
the peace of 1783. Probably the issues underlying no other 
event in American history have been so misunderstood by 
friends and opponents as those relating to this so-called 
" massacre. " The colonists regarded the British standing army 
as existing under British law. They considered that their 
consent — they not being represented in Parliament — had not 
been given to the standing army. They maintained that such 
consent could only be given by the legislatures of the several 
colonies. From the colonists' standpoint, the troops had no 
more constitutional right in Massachusetts than the Dutch 
soldiers had in England during the time of William III. The 
theory underlying the argument was the same as that on which 



II.] Committees of Correspondence. " 63 

the opposition to taxation rested. The colonists in short 
denied the existence of a legislative union with England. 
From another point of view the "massacre" was important 
because it showed the danger to the liberty of the subject 
incurred by the substitution of the military for the civil power. 
The removal of the troops, therefore, was commemorated as a 
victory for freedom. 

After the removal of the soldiers, a time of quiet supervened. 
For a moment, it seemed as if there were nothing to dispute 
about. The soldiers were out of sight, and the Tea Act was 
forgotten. The struggle was soon renewed. 

° . °° Local Com- 

Hutchinson refused to accept any salary from the mittees of Cor- 
province, and later it was announced that the despondence, 
judges would likewise be paid by the Crown. As may be easily 
imagined, it is difficult to stir up rebellion for the right to pay 
another's salary. Hutchinson, however, most rashly began an 
academic discussion as to the rights and duties of the colonists, 
proving conclusively that the position assumedby the colonists 
was unsound and that they must either submit or become inde- 
pendent. Hutchinson undoubtedly was right, but it was the 
height of imprudence to convince the colonists that they must 
submit to what they regarded as tyranny, or fight. Samuel 
Adams saw at once the advantage such a discussion gave to his 
side. Almost alone at this time, he ardently longed for inde- 
pendence. He organized a system of town Committees of 
Correspondence throughout the province and set on foot a 
discussion of the case. At the time no answering echo came 
to Massachusetts from the other colonies. One over-zealous 
ofificer had placed in Adams' s hand this most formidable weapon 
of revolutionary organization, the acts of another over-zealous 
officer gave Henry the opportunity to extend the system of 
extra-legal political organization to all the colonies. 

This latter official was Lieutenant Dudington, master of the 
revenue vessel Gaspee, employed in watching the waters of 



64 Constitutional Opposition, 1760-74. [Chap. 

Narragansett Bay. He had incurred the ill-will of all the 

merchants and traders on the bay. One night, 

,^t^*''"'^''°" a report was brought to Providence that the 

of the Gaspee. ^ . 

Gaspee was ground some few miles away. Led 
by the most prominent merchant in the place, men from Provi- 
dence boarded her in the middle of the night, seized the crew, 
and set the vessel on fire. The affair was really a personal 
encounter between an official and persons whom he had of- 
fended. It is not well to make mole-hills into mountains; and 
never was a mole-hill exaggerated as was this. A most porten- 
tous Commission, including three chief-justices, was sent to 
Rhode Island to inquire into the matter, to seize the perpetra- 
tors, and to convey them to another colony or to England for 
trial. Probably several hundred if not a thousand persons knew 
the names of nearly every one who had taken part in the burn- 
ing of the Gaspee, but not one name could the Commission of 
Inquiry discover. Moreover, the Chief-Justice of Rhode Island, 
Stephen Hopkins by name, declared that not a person should 
be removed from the colony for trial without its limits. The 
Commission abandoned the inquiry and reported its failure to 
the king. But the matter did not stop at that point. 

The Virginia Assembly happened to be in session when the 

report of the appointment of this Commission 

Committees reached the Old Dominion. Under the leader- 

of Corre- ^y^ of Patrick Henry and Thomas Jefferson, a 

spondence. , 

permanent Committee of Correspondence was 
appointed "to maintain a correspondence with our sister 
colonies " and to inform themselves particularly of the facts 
as to the Gaspee Commission. The resolution was communi- 
cated to the other colonies, but at first with discouraging re- 
sults, as only Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New 
Hampshire, and South Carolina joined Virginia in appointing 
Colonial Committees of Correspondence (July, 1773). The 
machinery, however, had been invented which might easily 



II.] Destructio7i of the Gaspee. 65 

develop into a complete organization, for, by combining the 
Virginia colonial committees with committees of local divisions 
as in Samuel Adams's plan, an extra-legal, yet not illegal, 
organization might be formed capable of exercising all the 
functions of the State. The attempt to compel the colonists 
to purchase tea on which the Parliamentary tax had been paid 
brought all the colonies into this revolutionary union. 

The English East India Company had never controlled the 
colonial tea market. The reason was, that in addition to the 
original cost and freight charges, to which all tea was liable, 
English tea was further liable to an inland duty 
of twelve-pence per pound to be paid on with- ""^^ "^^^ 
drawal from the warehouses for consumption in 
England, or for export to the colonies. Under the Townshend 
Acts it was still further burdened with a customs duty of three- 
pence per pound when landed in the colonies. In these cir- 
cumstances, the Dutch East India Company provided nearly 
all the tea consumed in America, which was smuggled in free 
of duty. The English company was now in severe financial 
straits. To help it out of its difficulties, the government pro- 
posed to permit it to send tea to the colonies without payment 
of the twelve-penny inland duty, but still liable to the three- 
penny Townshend tax. Friends of the government, and, it is 
stated, the company also, suggested that the latter tax should 
be paid by the company in England and added to the 
price of the tea without anything being said about it. But the 
government was immovable on that point. They were anxious 
to establish a precedent, and to accomplish that the tax must 
be paid in America. The colonists, regarding the whole busi- 
ness as an attempt to bribe them into surrender, by giving them 
tea cheaper than the people of England could buy it, refused 
from North to South, apparently without any urging from the 
Committees of Correspondence, to have anything whatever to^ 
do with it. Large quantities were at once despatched to 
C. A. 5 



V 



66 Constitutional Opposition, 1760-74. [Chap. 

Philadelphia, Charleston (South Carolina), New York, and 
Boston. The consignees at the two first-named ports resigned 
when requested by the people. No tea was landed at Phila- 
delphia and New York, the collectors of those ports allowing 
the vessels to clear without breaking bulk. At Charleston the 
collector insisted upon the tea being landed. It was stored in 
a damp cellar and soon spoiled. At Boston, however, a com- 
bination of circumstances brought on an explosion. 

Among the consignees were the sons of Governor Hutchin- 
.. ^w T, . son. They refused to resign. The collector of 

" The Boston _ ■' ° 

Tea Party," the port fcfused to allow the vessels to clear out- 

^'^' ^^^^' ward until the tea had been landed in conformity 

to law. The governor declined to grant a permit to the vessels 
to pass the fort until they were properly cleared. The only 
way to cut the knot was to destroy the tea, and it was thrown 
into the harbour by a mob. 

These occurrences at once aroused great excitement on 
^^ „ both sides of the Atlantic. Six more colonies 

The Repres- 
sive Acts of chose Committees of Correspondence, Pennsyl- 

'^^^^^ vania alone refusing. Unmindful of these things 

and of the action of Virginia on the occasions of the Stamp 

Act and the Gaspee Commission, the English government 

determined to isolate Massachusetts, and to crush out the spirit 

of resistance in that Province. Parliament speedily suspended, 

by statute, the operation of the Charter of Massachusetts, closed 

the port of Boston to commerce, and provided that persons 

accused of crimes, alleged to have been committed while 

putting down riots, should be transported for trial with the 

necessary witnesses to some place outside the colony. General 

Gage, the commander-in-chief of the British army in America, 

was commissioned governor with very extensive powers. At 

nearly the same time, the Quebec Act extended the limits of 

the Province of Quebec to include the country west of the 

Alleghanies, ac far south as the Ohio River. 



II.] The Acts of 1774. ^J 

The colonies of Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, 
Pennsylvania, and Virginia all claimed rights in 
this territory. The third and fourth clauses of , "^^^ Quebec 

■' Act, 1774. 

the act reserved the rights of holders of grants 
from the Crown. It is impossible to say precisely what this 
reservation meant, as no case involving these points has ever 
been decided by the courts. It is probable that the titles of 
Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Pennsylvania would have been 
recognized. These " saving clauses " do not seem to have been 
widely known in America. Quebec was largely inhabited by 
Roman Catholics, and was governed as a conquered province. 
This act was understood by the colonists to evince a disposi- 
tion on the part of the English government to limit the self- 
governing colonies to the seaboard, to establish the Roman 
Catholic Church in a large portion of British America, and to 
extend the use of the civil as distinguished from the common law. 
For these reasons its passage aroused feelings of bitter resent- 
ment among the colonists, whose passions were already excited 
by the harsh treatment measured out to the town of Boston. 

The people of the other colonies made the cause of Massa- 
chusetts their own. Washington offered to raise, 

° ' Jefferson s 

arm, and equip a thousand men at his own ex- Summary 
pense, and to march at their head to the defence '''^'' ^'^'^'^' 
of the people of Boston. From all parts of the continent came 
supplies of food, clothing, and other necessaries for the poor 
of the closed seaport. Jefferson, in his Summary View, boldly 
set forth the theory that Parliament had no authority whatever 
over the colonies, not even as to the regulation of the external 
trade of the colonies. This theory speedily found favour among 
a people who until 1774 had expressly admitted the legislative 
supremacy of the British Parliament in all cases whatsoever, 
excepting that of taxation. Everywhere the opposition party 
became bolder; everywhere it acquired increased strength. 
On the 17th of June, 1774, the Massachusetts legislature 

s— 2 



68 Constitutional Opposition, 1760-74. [Chap. 

was in session at Salem, the new capital of the province. The 
doors of the room, in which the Representatives 
tai Congress were in session, were locked. Samuel Adams 
summoned. moved a resolution providing for a Continental 

Congress to be held at Philadelphia on September ist next en- 
suing. The two Adamses and two other persons were then chosen 
to represent Massachusetts in the Congress. While this debate 
was in progress, the Secretary of the Province, standing on 
the staircase, just without the Representatives' door, read a 
proclamation from the governor, dissolving the assembly. 
This time the call for a congress was responded to most 

heartily. The First Continental Congress as- 
First Conti- •' . ° _ 

nentai Con- sembled at the appointed day, all the colonies 

gress, 1774. except Georgia being represented. It was dis- 

tinctly in the control of those who advocated moderation, and 
were not prepared to go to the lengths advocated by Jefferson 
in the Summary Vietv. This was recognized by the New 
Englanders, who kept as much as possible in the back- 
ground. The Declaration of Rights, voted by this Con- 
gress, was mild in tone, and the same criticism applies to the 
memorials, petitions, etc. published by it. The one important 
measure initiated by this body was the " Association " to secure 
the carrying out of a new non-importation and non-consumption 
agreement. The Congress recommended that committees should 
be elected by each town, county, or other administrative unit, 
by whatever name it was called, to oversee the execution of the 
non-intercourse policy. These committees were supervised by 
the legislative Committees of Correspondence. The names of 
offenders against the Association were to be published, and 
any colony refusing to enter the Association should be regarded 
as inimical to "the' liberties of this country," and denied all 
intercourse with the members of the Association. Thus the 
colonies were for the first time united into one political organi- 
zation, apart from the British Empire. Moreover, the organi- 



II.] The First Continental Congress. 69 

zation was so perfect that it controlled the movements of the 
humblest individual. Having set this machinery in motion, 
the Congress adjourned, not without providing, however, for 
the assembling of a new Congress in the following May (1775), 
in case the grievances of the colonists should not be redressed 
before that time. There probably were not a dozen men in all 
the colonies at that time (October, 1774) who wished for in- 
dependence. Furthermore, probably not a dozen men in all 
the colonies supposed that the breaking out of civil war was 
only a matter of a few months. Had there been a strong, 
wise, and prudent man at the head of affairs at Boston the 
rupture might have been postponed for many years. 

General Gage, now civil and military governor of Massa- 
chusetts, was neither wise, nor prudent, nor 

' . . ' ^ ' Gage, Gover- 

strong. He had at his disposal a small veteran nor of Massa- 
army, supposed to be adequate to cope with any ^ "setts, 1774. 
force likely to be brought against it. As the result proved, this 
army was powerless in his hands to do more than maintain 
itself in Boston. Moreover, Gage annoyed the colonists by 
petty reprisals whose complete success could have had slight 
influence on the impending crisis, but whose failure meant 
certain disaster and rebellion. 

In September, he issued precepts for the election of Repre- 
sentatives to a General Court to be held at ^he Massa- 
Salem in October, 1774. The situation of affairs chusetts 

. \ r I • 1 1 Provincial 

became so threatenmg before that time that he congress, 
prorogued the assembly before it met. The °'^'- '^^4 
Representatives assembled at the appointed time, however, 
formed themselves into a Provincial Congress, and adjourned 
to Cambridge. The theory which they advanced was that 
Gage, refusing to govern in accordance with the Charter of 
Massachusetts, had abdicated his authority: there was therefore 
no longer any properly constituted authority in the province, 
and the people must look to their own safety. This theory 



70 Constittitional Opposition, 1760-74. [Chap. 

rested on the assumption that Parliament had no constitutional 
power to suspend the charter of a colony, in whole or in part, 
or to interfere in any way with the internal concerns of any 
colony. The Provincial Congress, acting for the people of 
Massachusetts, appointed a Committee of Safety to act with 
other committees as an executive. It also appointed a Re- 
ceiver-General, or Colonial Treasurer, and advised the town 
authorities to pay the taxes, usually levied on the inhabitants 
of the towns, to him and not to the official acting under the 
authority of the king. Preparations for armed resistance were 
now pushed forward. 

On the other hand. Gage found himself almost isolated in 
- . , Boston. Workingmen refused to work for him, 

Lexington ° ' 

and Concord, and as the farmers refused to sell him supplies, 
pri 19, 1775- ]^g ^g^g obliged to import food for his army from 
Halifax. Alarmed at the hostile spirit everywhere displayed, 
he determined to disarm the populace of eastern Massachusetts. 
The first attempt to seize arms ended in a failure, but without 
bloodshed. Later on (April 19th, 1775), he sent out a strong 
detachment to seize stores said to be accumulated at Concord, 
a small town about eighteen miles from Boston. He had 
expected to surprise the colonists, but the secret became known 
before the troops left Boston on the night of the eighteenth. 
When the soldiers reached Lexington, on their way to Concord, 
they discovered a small body of militia, drawn up as if to 
oppose them, which however dispersed in the face of such a 
strong force. It is not certain which party fired first, as the 
accounts are conflicting, nor is it important; but it is certain 
that blood was shed on Lexington Common in the early hours 
of that April morning. Pressing onward, the soldiers reached 
Concord to find that most of the stores and munitions of war 
had been removed to some place of greater security. They 
destroyed a few barrels of flour, burned a cart-wheel or two, 
and disabled a few iron field-pieces. While there, they were 



n.] Lexington and Concord, lyyS- 71 

assailed by the militiamen, and their starting on the return 
march to Boston was the signal for a general attack, which 
continued until the survivors gained the protection of the guns 
of the men-of-war anchored off Charlestown. Instead of 
returning home, the colonists encamped at Cambridge and 
began the siege of Boston. The time for constitutional oppo- 
sition was now at an end. The rightfulness of the colonial 
theories must be tested by war, or, to use the phrase of that 
time, "by an appeal to God." 



CHAPTER III. 



REVOLUTION. 



The fifteen years covering the events described in the last 

chapter (i 760-1 775) were years of growth in 

The Colo- population and in material resources without 

nists in 1775. i^ ^ 

parallel in the colonial period. The total popu- 
lation increased from sixteen hundred thousand in 1760 to 
nearly two and one-half million souls in 1 7 7 5 . The slaves formed 
about one-fifth of this total — numbering in 1775 nearly half a 
million to about four hundred thousand in 1 760. The increase 
in slave population was confined to the South, and was made 
up largely of fresh importations from Africa. The total popu- 
lations of the North and South were nearly equal, in the 
proportion of about thirteen to eleven; but the white popula- 
tion of the colonies, north of Mason and Dixon's line, far 
outnumbered that of the colonies to the southward. A further 
examination of the statistics will enable one better to under- 
stand the greater capacity for resistance displayed by the North 
in the coming conflict. For instance, the two largest colonies, 
Virginia and Massachusetts, contained respectively five hundred 
and fifty thousand and three hundred and fifty thousand in- 
habitants. The white population of the two colonies, however, 
was in the proportion of four to three and one-half. The next 

72 



Chap, hi.] The Colonists in lyj^. 73 

largest colony was Pennsylvania, containing three hundred 
thousand inhabitants, nearly all white. In South Carolina, the 
negroes formed nearly two-thirds of the total of two hundred 
thousand. On the other hand, Connecticut, with about the 
same total population, contained hardly any blacks, slave or 
free. The fighting strength of the colonies having large slave 
populations was reduced nearly in the proportion of the blacks 
to the whites. 

Notwithstanding the disputes as to the enforcement of the 
trade laws and the complaints made by the „ . , 

J^ •' Material 

colonies, it appears to be well ascertained that prosperity, 
commerce and trade had flourished to an ex- '^ ^~^^" 
traordinary degree. Manufacturing had been extended, and, 
although it was still on a small scale, the Revolution found the 
colonists nearly self-supporting. Munitions of war were no 
doubt lacking, and at first there seemed to be no way to 
replenish them within the colonies. Gunpowder was soon 
manufactured there, however, and a lead mine in Virginia 
furnished material for bullets until the vein gave out in 1781. 
But the greater part of the supplies of war-materials were either 
captured from the British or procured from the French. 

The younger men among the colonists knew little of actual 
warfare. But everywhere there were veterans ^^ ^^.^ ^^ 
of the French wars, Washington and Prescott, the colonists 
for instance, who soon infused a knowledge of °^ '^^^' 
military methods into the masses of raw recruits. Experience 
showed that time had not diminished the fighting qualities of 
the race which disputed the fields of Naseby, Worcester, and 
Dunbar. The descendants of Cavaliers and Ironsides fought 
side by side in the American armies. With them might often 
have been discovered the grandchildren of the brave defenders 
of Limerick and Londonderry. In fact, the most venturesome 
of all parties in the great contests of the Stuart period had 
either emigrated or had been deported to the colonies. 



74 Revolution. [Chap. 

The Americans were peculiarly fortunate in their leaders. 
,,, ^. , As a man, and as a leader of men, George 

Washington, ° 

Greene, and Washington occupics an unique position among 

a ayette. historic pcrsonages of ancient and modern times. 

Other men have been more brilliant than he; but in no other 
man have considerable abilities been combined with absolute 
honesty and steadfastness of purpose as they were in him. 
Always serious, as if conscious of his own greatness, he never 
for one moment faltered. As a strategist and tactician, he was 
not the equal of some of his subordinates. It must not be 
supposed, however, that Washington did not know when to 
strike and how to strike hard. The return of the offensive at 
Trenton and the rescue of the army at Monmouth will for ever 
remain among the most instructive operations of war. More 
important for a man in his position, he was able to wait, and 
feared not the reproach of the moment. Cold and impassive 
in bearing, he yet inspired his men with confidence and respect. 
The greatest soldier, as a soldier, on the American side, was 
Nathanael Greene. Born of Quaker stock, in the little colony 
of Rhode Island, he taught himself the art of war, buying and 
borrowing books on that subject far and wide. Marching at the 
head of the Rhode Island troops, at the summons sent forth 
from Lexington, he at once gained a position to which neither 
his age, his experience, nor the force at his back entitled him. 
Washington, one of the wealthiest of the Virginia aristocrats, 
confided in the military insight of this son of the most demo- 
cratic colony, as he confided in that of no other man. In the 
beginning, Greene made many mistakes; but a few lessons in 
real fighting, combined with his theoretical training, made him 
a very efficient commander of a division or an independent 
force. Another soldier, worthy of mention with Washington 
and Greene, was Anthony Wayne, whose impetuosity in attack 
earned for him the sobriquet of "Mad Anthony." Un- 
stable in character and ignorant of strategy, Wayne executed 



III.] Military Leaders. 75 

orders in a splendid manner. Of another ofificer one would 
wish to speak here. In military sagacity, bravery, and 
enthusiasm Benedict Arnold was a great soldier. His faults, 
leading to presumption and extravagance in living, hindered 
his advancement, and finally drove him to commit treason. 
But as the leader of a division in a hardly contested fight, few 
men have stood higher than he. Among the foreign officers 
who gathered beneath the standard of the young republic, 
Lafayette was first in place and merit. Like Washington, he 
was a man of means and of high social position. Although 
very young at this time, he never failed to justify the confidence 
which intrusted him with important commands. Another 
foreigner, Steuben, a Prussian veteran, who was appointed 
Inspector-General, made the Continental Line — as the more 
permanent American forces were termed — an efiticient body 
of troops. Many foreign officers were given positions which 
they could not sustain. Charles Lee, a renegade Englishman, 
committed treason many times; and of Horatio Gates, a recent 
immigrant to Virginia, it is difficult to speak with calmness. 
He was self-sufficient and cowardly; and he treated his sub- 
ordinates with a spirit of unfairness and jealousy hardly to be 
conceived. 

It is not necessary to say much concerning the British com- 
manders. Gage's reputation was so shattered at Howe 
Bunker Hill that no one has ever tried to re- cunton, and 
habilitate it. Sir William Howe, Gage's sue- "■■g°yne. 
cessor, commanded in the field on that memorable occasion, 
and ever afterwards evinced the greatest caution in assailing 
works defended by the colonists. He was also fond of luxury 
and ease. At all events, he threw away every opportunity of 
crushing his enemy in 1776, the most critical year for the 
colonists. Burgoyne might have done well on the open fields 
of Europe, but in the woods of northern New York he was 
surely out of place. Sir Henry Clinton seems to have had 



^6 Revohition. [Chap. 

ability; but he, like Howe, was fond of winter-quarters; so fond 
of them, indeed, that Rodney, who passed a few weeks in New 
York in 1780, felt obliged to protest against his inactivity. 
Another obstacle to Clinton's success was the fact that Lord 
George Germaine, who, as Colonial Secretary, managed the 
war, had more confidence in Cornwallis, Clinton's subordinate, 
than he had in the commander-in-chief. This was in a measure 
justifiable, as Cornwallis showed more enterprise than any 
other British general. But the difficulties of the theatre of his 
campaigns were nearly insuperable. The great blot on the 
military reputations of Clinton and Cornwallis was the fortifica- 
tion of Yorktown. Each sought to throw the blame for that 
blunder on the other. A careful consideration of all the docu- 
ments produced by the two contestants points irresistibly to 
the conclusion that neither was responsible for it, and that it 
was due to an excusable misunderstanding of Clinton's orders 
by Cornwallis. Many of the subordinate commanders were 
men of ability, but the shadow of Lord George Germaine 
was over the whole enterprise. Had an able man, like the 
elder Pitt, been in control, many disasters would have been 
avoided. 

The caution so often displayed by the British commanders 
,, , was combined with a rashness produced by 

Results of . 

British rash- contempt for their opponents, and ignorance of 
"^^^' the problem in hand, that is sometimes almost 

beyond belief. A few examples will well illustrate this point. 
Gage sent one thousand men on an expedition, eighteen miles 
away from the main army, into a region where twelve thousand 
armed soldiers gathered about them in less than twelve hours. 
Howe led three thousand men, burdened with heavy knap- 
sacks, up a steep hill, across fences and over ploughed land, on 
an intensely hot day, against soldiers commanded by veterans 
and protected by earthworks, and in consequence lost one-half 
his command. Burgoyne sent five hundred men away from his 



III.] The Theatre of War. 77 

main army into a' region whence the captors of Ticonderoga 
had issued, and within reach of five times their own number of 
the enemy, commanded by one of the defenders of Bunker 
Hill. He lost the original detachment and part of another 
sent to its assistance. Tarleton attacked an American force 
of the same size as his own, commanded by Daniel Morgan, a 
man of great ability, without waiting to form his troops in line 
of battle. He lost nearly all of them, and barely escaped 
capture himself. These are a few examples of operations which 
might have been justified against the inhabitants of India, but 
against an enemy of British stock such rashness was criminal. 
The rank and file of the British army was excellent, and the 
terrible loss suffered at Bunker Hill was as much to their credit 
as it was to the discredit of their chiefs. 

The theatre of war measured some thousand miles in extent 
from north to south — from the Penobscot to the 
Savannah. It was intersected by deep rivers "^^ Theatre 
and large arms of the sea. Indeed, in place 
of one field of operations, there were a dozen. Thus the 
Hudson River separated the Eastern from the Middle Colonies, 
and the Mohawk divided the Hudson valley again into two 
distinct geographical districts. The Delaware River and Bay 
bisected the Middle Colonies, and Virginia was cut up into 
many long slender tracts of land by numerous large streams, 
the James, the York, the Potomac, and others. These rivers, 
flowing generally from west to east, made an invasion from 
north to south, or the reverse, a matter of great difficulty. In 
the extreme south, the settlements on the seaboard were sepa- 
rated from those on the mountain slopes by long stretches of 
sandy barren land, sparsely inhabited. In the south, too, there 
were many rivers subject to sudden freshets and fordable, even 
at low water, only at long intervals. It was possible to seize 
the towns on the seaboard; but it proved to be exceedingly 
difficult to sustain an army in the interior. Everything, in 



78 Revolution. [Chap. 

short, so far as natural conditions of the country were con- 
cerned, made in favour of the defence. 

Under these circumstances, the American army should have 

been followed wherever it went and fought to the 
British &vi^. Instead of making that army the objective, 

the British plan of operations consisted in the 
occupation of territory. A base for the storage of munitions of 
war, for hospitals, and for a repairing station for the fleets was 
necessary. The seizure of New York for that purpose was, 
therefore, justifiable. But that should have been all. As long 
as Washington, with his poorly-clad army, could keep the field, 
the British soldiers, supplied with an abundance of everything, 
should have followed him. Instead of so doing, no sooner was 
one town captured, than preparations were made to capture 
another. Each place as it was occupied required an army to 
maintain it. The rebellion could have been crushed only by 
stamping out opposition, not by seizing land. It will be well 
to note two leading errors of this kind. Boston was of no 
conceivable use to the British from a military standpoint. The 
army was necessarily at Boston in the beginning of the conflict, 
but Boston should have been evacuated the moment it became 
clear that Massachusetts would have the support of the other 
colonies, and this seems to have been the opinion of both Gage 
and Howe. Yet a British army was blockaded in that town 
for nearly eleven months, and the opportunity thus given the 
other colonies to organize their governments and armies was 
well used. The capture of Philadelphia in 1777 was even 
more inexcusable. The Continental Congress held its meetings 
at Philadelphia, but that town was not a capital in the sense 
that its capture would disorganize the government. Congress 
was obliged to move to some other town — that was all. But 
the occupation of Philadelphia withdrew another army from 
the field, as it was beyond supporting-distance from New 
York. 



III.] British Strategy. 79 

The war begun in New England was recommenced in the 
Middle Colonies. Before the conquest of either 
of those sections was even fairly certain, the Character of 

•' ' the contest. 

conquest of the South was undertaken. The 
New Englanders proved themselves able to deal with every 
force the British government placed in that section. With 
some help from the other colonies, the people of the Middle 
Colonies held the British in one or two seaboard towns. In 
the South, Cornwallis seemed to be supreme for a time. But 
Greene, with fifteen hundred regulars, assisted by large bodies 
of Southern militiamen, compelled the evacuation of the Caro- 
linas. Cornwallis m.arched up and down Virginia, attended 
closely by Lafayette, but at the end of the campaign he held 
only one town. Thus each section when attacked seemed able 
to defend itself. Under these circumstances, had there been 
no interference from outside, the struggle would have con- 
tinued until the people either of America or of Great Britain 
should become exhausted. It is by no means certain that the 
Americans would have been the first to succumb. We of the 
present day lay too much stress on the evil effects of a de- 
preciated currency and large debts. The social organization 
of the colonies, outside of the few large towns, was very simple. 
The people as a whole could have got on well enough had 
there been no currency at all. The farmers ploughed, planted, 
and reaped in comparative security. In the intervals of farm 
work, they would shoulder their muskets and fight Burgoyne or 
Cornwallis, then return home and go on with their labour. 
The sea-faring inhabitants of the coast engaged in privateering, 
and made a fair living from that precarious calling. War con- 
ducted on these lines might have continued indefinitely. The 
contest, however, was not to be thus decided. France, anxious 
to regain her lost prestige, joined the colonists as soon as 
Burgoyne's surrender made it reasonably certain that they could 
maintain themselves. Later, Spain and Holland took part in 



8o Revolution. [Chap. 

the struggle. The navy of France gave the supremacy of the 
sea to the Allies for a few weeks in 1781, and Cornwallis was 
captured with his army. It is correct, therefore, to say that 
the aid afforded by France decided the conflict. It is, never- 
theless, by no means certain that, had France held aloof, the 
contest would have had any different termination — although 
the end would no doubt have been postponed. 

The "Siege of Boston" began on April 19th, 1775, and 
,,^. ^ continued until March 17th, 1776, 'when the 

' Siege of I t I I J 

Boston," 1775- British abandoned the town. During that time, 
' ■ from five to ten thousand veterans, commanded 

by live generals. Gage, Burgoyne, Howe, Clinton, and Pigott, 
suffered themselves to be blockaded in a small town, often ill- 
supplied with provisions, fuel and forage, by a force consisting 
of from ten to twenty thousand undisciplined farmers and 
mechanics. This latter force was poorly equipped and changed 
in size and composition every week. Until July, 1775, it had 
no commander-in-chief. This inactivity of the British army 
is easily explained. The town of Boston was built upon a 
peninsula, which was connected with the mainland by a narrow 
strip of sand over which the tide sometimes flowed. This was 
defended by the besieged. But at the landward end, the 
blockading force had erected strong works which prevented 
egress from the town in that direction. In this way it was 
difficult for the British army to attack the colonists. Further- 
more, the army blockading Boston was a mere vanguard. The 
whole adult male population within a radius of forty miles 
formed the real army besieging Boston. Forty thousand men 
could have been placed in the field for a few days' service at 
any time. Then, too, the topography of the country greatly 
favoured the insurgents. The eastern part of Massachusetts 
is composed of relics of the terminal moraine of an ancient 
glacier in the shape of little oval hills called drumlins by the 
geologists. Three of these little hills — one of them known 



III.] Bimker Hill. 8i 

as Bunker Hill — formed a peninsula on which the town of 
Charlestown was built. This was situated between the Charles 
and Mystic Rivers to the north of Boston. It was connected 
with the mainland by a narrow isthmus which might well be 
described as a natural causeway. South and east of Boston was 
another and similar " neck, " then known as Dorchester Heights, 
but now forming South Boston. The road for the British out of 
Boston and for the colonists into that town lay in the possession 
of one or both of these subordinate peninsulas. On June i6th, 
reports reached the Colonial head-quarters that Gage intended 
to seize Dorchester Heights. The colonists determined to 
divert him from the execution of this plan by seizing the 
Charlestown hills. The occupation of this position had been 
long in contemplation, in connection with batteries to be placed 
on hills on the mainland, whose fire, converging in front of the 
works to be erected on Bunker Hill, would prevent a successful 
assault. But the supporting forts could not be supplied with 
artillery, and the project had been deferred. It was now 
decided to seize Bunker Hill, and to defend it as well as 
possible. But Prescott and his men, marching in the darkness 
of the night of June 16-17, passed Bunker Hill and threw up 
a redoubt on Breed's Hill, nearer Boston. The conflict is 
always known, however, as the Battle of Bunker Hill. Instead 
of using his preponderance in shipping to attack the Americans 
from the rear. Gage ordered an assault in front. Prescott and 
Stark, with some three thousand men, defended the redoubt 
and connecting lines. Howe, Clinton, and Pigott led five 
thousand men to the attack. Twice that splendid force 
marched up the hill to be turned back by a musketry fire. 
The third assault succeeded, mainly because the American 
ammunition was exhausted. The loss of from one thousand to 
fifteen hundred of their men attests the gallantry of the British 
soldiers. Few more splendid actions are recorded in history. 
But the comparative smallness of the colonial loss, four hundred 
C. A. 6 



82 Revolution. [Chap. 

and forty-one — • most of which was suffered during the hasty 
retreat — shows the nature of the task to which Gage had set his 
men. The Americans were beaten at Bunker Hill and driven 
from the field; but the gallant defence they had made gave 
them a feeling of confidence in themselves of the greatest 
importance in the ensuing campaigns. 

The Second Continental Congress met at Philadelphia, 
„ .„ May, I77S- It continued in existence until 

Second Con- -" ' ' •^ 

tinentai Con- the Articles of Confederation went into opera- 
gress, 1775. ^j^^ in 1 78 1. At first it was only a meeting of 

the radical leaders in the several colonies. It soon acquired 
supreme power and exercised the functions of a sovereign. 
It adopted the army blockading Boston as its own, and 
^^ „, undertook the defence of Massachusetts as a 

The War 

becomes gen- national affair. Political necessity required a 
erai, June, 1775. southern man to lead the army, and George 
Washington, a delegate from Virginia, was appointed Com- 
mander-in-chief (June, 1775), the actual commanders in the 
field being commissioned as major and brigadier-generals. 
Washington's place in the Virginia delegation was filled by the 
election of Thomas Jefferson, a much younger man, but already 
prominent from the boldness of his written opinions. Congress 
now issued a " Declaration setting forth the Reasons for Taking 
up Arms." Later, another petition was sent to the king, 
praying him, as "constitutional arbiter" between the several 
parts of the Empire, to use his veto power to protect his loyal 
American subjects from the oppression of his subjects living in 
England, exercised in the form of acts of Parliament. The 
only answer vouchsafed to this "Olive Branch" petition was a 
proclamation against traitors and rebels. In this manner the 
king drove more persons to rebellion than all the radical 
leaders in the colonies had done in the whole course of the 
dispute. Until that time, hundreds of thousands of persons, 
who denied the legislative power of Parliament, were strong in 



III.] Siege of Boston. 83 

their loyalty to the king; soon they were to be ready for inde- 
pendence. 

Washington took command of the American army at 
Cambridge on July 3rd, 1775. He soon 

° ■> J -3 ^ I I J Evacuation 

brought some semblance of order out of the of Boston, 
military chaos which then prevailed. With '^^'^^'^^^^■ 
an army constantly fluctuating in numbers, without heavy 
ordnance, and for weeks at a time without powder, he presented 
a firm front to the British. The magazines of Ticonderoga and 
Crown Point, seized in May, 1775, supplied ordnance as soon 
as the snow of the next winter made transportation possible. 
The Massachusetts navy provided powder, the spoil of an 
ordnance vessel captured from the British. In March, 1776, 
Washington was able to take the offensive. He seized Dor- 
chester Heights and compelled the evacuation of Boston. In 
the interim, an invasion of Canada, led by Montgomery and 
Benedict Arnold, had proved a complete failure. 

The first half of the year 1776 was, in some respects, the 
most important in the history of the country. 
Then it was decided to break loose from the towards 
mother land and to establish a new nation upon ""dependence, 
the American soil. Many English writers, from the epoch of 
the Revolution to the present day, have conceived themselves 
able to trace the independence of the United States back to the 
first settlement of the older colonies. This is true in the sense 
that the causes which ultimately brought about independence 
may be discovered in the beginning of the seventeenth century. 
It is not true, however, that any considerable body of colonists 
expected or desired independence earlier than the year 1776. 
Washington stated that in July, 1775, when he took command 
of the army, he "abhorred" the idea of independence, l^o 
doubt he expressed the feeling of the great mass of the people 
at that time. The modern American student, so far from 
being able to discern any conscious growth towards independ- 

6—2 



84 Revolution. [Chap. 

ence, is impressed by the great reluctance with which the people 
approached the final separation. The contemptuous rejection 
of the " Olive Branch " petition converted many. Among other 
important steps in bringing about a change of sentiment, was the 
necessity for making new provisions for the local governments. 
As the contest widened, one colony after another found 
itself without any government. In some cases 
constifufion^^. ^^^ attempt of the king's representative to pre- 
vent assistance being sent to Massachusetts 
brought on the conflict. In other cases, the endeavour to 
settle some local grievance by force compelled the governor's 
abdication. In Massachusetts, a Provincial Congress, repre- 
senting the people, assumed power in the beginning. After- 
wards, the Charter government was restored without a governor 
— the Council performing many of the executive functions. 
Connecticut and Rhode Island continued under their seven- 
teenth century charters, and New Hampshire was the only 
New England colony which was governed as a Royal Prov- 
ince. The departure of the governor left affairs in a state 
of disorder in that province. The people of New Hampshire 
were obliged to make some provision for government in order 
to protect themselves and to aid Massachusetts. They ap- 
plied to the Continental Congress for advice, and, in con- 
formity to its suggestion, established (Jan. 1776) a temporary 
organization " to continue only during the present unhappy 
differences with Great Britain." In May, 1776, every colony 
was in open revolt. Congress then advised each colony to 
assume such form of government as should seem best. The 
first colony to act under this vote was Virginia, which had 
been governed for some time by a "Convention," elected by 
the people. The first constitution of Virginia, adopted in 
June, 1776, is of considerable historical interest. The Bill of 
Rights prefixed to it was the work of George Mason. It con- 
tained an admirable exposition of the American theory of 



in.] The State Constitutions. 85 

government, only equalled in that respect by the Declaration 
of Independence and by the Bill of Rights, drawn up by John 
Adams and adopted by Massachusetts in 1780. The Virginia 
Constitution also contained a Declaration of Independence, 
and a summary of the causes which led to this action, from the 
pen of Thomas Jefferson. It bears a close resemblance to the 
great declaration, and was formulated only a few weeks earlier. 
It is important to notice that this action of New Hampshire 
and Virginia was taken, as above stated, in conformity with the 
advice of the Continental Congress. 

No one can read the State papers of the revolutionary 
period without being impressed with the consti- 
tutional knowledge and literary skill of their c^mmfn Sense 
authors. Yet it well may be doubted if, all 
put together, they exerted so much influence in bringing the 
people to an acquiescence in the policy of independence as 
was exerted by one small pamphlet, Thomas Paine 's Common 
Sense. It is fortunate that our task does not require a de- 
scription of Paine's personal character. He came to America, 
was recognized as a man of remarkable literary power, and was 
encouraged by Franklin and Jefferson, who may have been 
unaware of the moral contamination which lurked in his 
neighbourhood. Certainly, he was a friend to liberty. In 
January, 1776, he published, anonymously, a pamphlet showing 
in simple language that "common sense " dictated independ- 
ence. Among other reasons which he gave, was the improb- 
ability of foreign nations interfering in the dispute so long as 
the Americans acknowledged allegiance to the British king. 
The essay met with great favour. It was read and debated in 
smithy and shop, and converted thousands of the people. 

Virginia now again took the lead, and directed her delegates 
in Congress to propose a declaration of inde- _ 
pendence. The motion was made in Congress of independ- 
by Richard Henry Lee, the chairman of the ^""' ^^^ ' 



86 Revolution. [Chap. 

Virginia delegation, on June 17th, 1776. It was seconded by 
John Adams of Massachusetts. As many delegates were not 
instructed in the matter or, indeed, united in the approval of 
the proposal, the discussion of the motion was postponed for 
two weeks. To save time, however, a committee consisting of 
Jefferson, Franklin, John Adams, and two more, was appointed 
to prepare a declaration for discussion in case the motion 
should be adopted. This committee intrusted the drafting of 
the document to Jefferson, while it fell to John Adams to 
defend the motion on the floor of Congress. The ablest man 
on the other side was John Dickinson, a most patriotic and 
high-minded statesman. As the debates of Congress were 
secret and no notes of this disputation were ever published, we 
have slight knowledge of the arguments of the two champions. 
After more delay, and after a good deal of concession on both 
sides, the motion was finally carried on July 2nd, 1776. Two 
days later, on July 4, 1776, the Declaration of Independence 
was adopted, though somewhat toned down and in a few cases 
materially altered from Jefferson's original draft. Some weeks 
afterwards, it was signed by the members of Congress present 
at the time of signing. This was done probably to protect 
Hancock, the presiding officer of Congress, who had attested 
the first copies of the document sent out on July 5th. The 
Declaration of Independence, apart from its arraignment of 
the king, contains the clearest definition of the theory of 
democratic government in existence. It is, therefore, of inter- 
est not to Americans alone, but to all civilized peoples. The 
Declaration contained in a concise form the theory of govern- 
ment commonly held by the people of the United States. It 
was the result of a long historical development, and was of 
American and English parentage. The ideas of Locke and 
Hooker can be seen in every sentence of the theoretical part. 
In fact, so impregnated was Jefferson with the language of 
Locke's essay, that, in some cases, he repeats the very words 



III.] Declaration of Independe^ice. ^y 

of the great philosopher. In his Ancient Laivs, Sir Henry 
Maine makes the curious statement, which has been repeated 
by later and less distinguished writers, that, in their great 
Declaration, the American jurists combined the French idea of 
equality with the more familiar English doctrine, that all men 
are born free. It will be interesting for the student to turn to 
the Declaration itself^ and observe that there is no statement in 
that document to the effect that men are born free; the words 
are, "all men are created equal." Furthermore, the doctrine 
of natural equality is to be found in Hooker's Ecclesiastical 
Polity and in Locke's Essay on Government. Later, at the 
outbreak of the French Revolution, Jefferson was United 
States Minister at Paris. He returned to America in 1790, 
greatly influenced by French ideas. But there is not the least 
evidence that in 1776 he knew anything of French political 
writers, except Montesquieu, and in the latter' s book there is 
no statement of the natural equality of man. The Americans 
received valuable material aid from France. Their theories 
they inherited from their fathers, as their portion of the 
common heritage of the English race. 

The seat of war was now shifted to the Middle States. In 
.the summer of 1776, Sir William Howe, the new 
commander-in-chief, entered New York harbour The Hessians, 
with a powerful army, convoyed by a strong fleet 
under the command of Admiral Lord Howe. A large portion 
of the new troops were German veterans hired from their 
masters, the Landgrave of Hesse-Cassel, the Duke of Brunswick, 
and some others. The "dirty selfishness" of these men, as 
Frederick the Great termed it, is beneath contempt, and almost 
beyond belief, were it not so well authenticated. These leased 
soldiers, for it would be unfair to call those mercenaries who 
had not the option to go or stay, numbered, including all 
who came to America, some thirty thousand men. About 

1 Appendix II. 



88 Revolution. [Chap. 

eighteen thousand arrived in 1776, mostly from Hesse-Cassel. 
For this reason, the whole body was known to the Americans 
under the generic term of Hessians. To the English govern- 
ment there seemed nothing incongruous in hiring these men. 
The British king was a German prince — although he himself 
had been born in England. In the wars which Great Britain 
had waged on the Continent it had been customary to hire the 
Germans, in one way or another, to iight Britain's battles. The 
only new circumstance in this case was the fact that these 
foreign soldiers were now employed to kill English people who 
happened to live beyond the ocean. The opposition in Par- 
liament remonstrated against the business for this reason, but 
their remonstrance was unavailing. The great mass of English- 
men seem to have viewed with rejoicing the acquisition of 
a force which they were led to believe was both cheap and 
efficient. In reality, the employment of these soldiers was one 
of the greatest mistakes made by the government. It aroused 
in the breasts of many lukewarm Americans a desire for inde- 
pendence; it induced others to acquiesce in the Declaration 
of Independence; and it justified, in the eyes of many men, 
the alliance with France and Spain. The fate of these poor 
"Hessian " soldiers was indeed a hard one. Torn from their 
firesides and families, they were sent to the conquest of a 
savage people — for so most of them regarded the Americans. 
They found the art of war quite undeveloped in many re- 
spects in America. In Europe, where the father of this same 
Landgrave of Hesse-Cassel had in one campaign loaned six 
thousand soldiers to either side, the amenities of war were 
fully developed. There was as little shooting as possible, 
and one might almost imagine the two pickets of the op- 
posing forces calmly smoking their pipes together and com- 
municating the latest news from home. With the Americans 
the case was different. They were fighting for everything that 
was dear to them. Whenever they had a good opportunity 



III.] The Hessians. 89 

to shoot an opponent, they shot him. The American states- 
men, however, endeavoured to induce the " Hessians " to 
desert. In 1776, Congress passed a resolution, drafted by 
Jefferson, Franklin, and John Adams, offering land in amounts 
of one thousand acres to every Hessian colonel, with suitable 
amounts to other officers, and one hundred acres to every 
private who should desert. Before the end of the war, the 
Hessians and the Americans understood each other well, and 
desertions seem to have been frequent. The most attractive 
person in this throng was the Baroness Riedesel, the young 
wife of one of the Hessian generals. She is chiefly memorable 
for a charming journal which she kept, and which gives us 
glimpses of American life as viewed by an outsider. On her 
way to America, she heard a story of the indecent and brutal 
treatment of two women by the Boston mob. This tale, given 
on hearsay evidence, was incorporated by Lord Mahon in his 
history, and has been repeated by later and generally fairer 
writers. There is not the slightest hint as to any such occur- 
rence in any newspaper of that time, in the papers of the very 
respectable family to which the alleged victims belonged, nor 
in any document of that period which has come to light. The 
Boston rabble did many things which might well have been left 
undone, but there is no recorded instance of their behaving 
indecently to any woman. The story was probably told to the 
credulous German woman by some person as ill-disposed to 
her as to the Americans. International comity, to say nothing 
of the ties of blood, might well forbid the relating of such 
discreditable anecdotes, except when well attested. 

Washington gathered to the defence of New York about 
one-half as many men as Howe could place in 
the field. Yet the latter general by his supine- '^^^ ^f^\ 

^ J r paign of 1776. 

ness allowed the Americans to escape from Long 

Island, and then from Manhattan Island, on the southern end 

of which New York City then stood. Still hesitating, Howe 



go Revolution. [Chap. 

occupied the whole of the following autumn and early winter in 
driving one part of the American army up the Hudson, and 
the other part across the Delaware. Then, instead of following 
up Washington's diminishing and poorly-equipped forces, he 
placed his fine army in winter-quarters extending from the 
Hudson to the Delaware, a distance in a straight line of some 
seventy-five miles! This was Washington's opportunity, and 
well he improved it. 

Crossing the Delaware on Christmas night, 1776, with about 

twenty-four hundred men, he marched through 
of'^Tr^enton"^^ storm and cold to Trenton. At daybreak he 

surprised the Hessian detachment stationed 
there, capturing nearly one thousand men — one hundred and 
fifty more making good their escape. This sudden and deci- 
sive return of the offensive saved the Revolution, which, at that 
moment, seemed about to perish from inanition. Cornwallis, 
with a strong force, was immediately sent against the Americans. 
Outwitting him, Washington fought a sharp action at Princeton 
and gained the high lands of New Jersey. His presence there 
compelled Howe to abandon his distant outposts and to keep 
his army within supporting distance from New York. 

The British plan of campaign for 1777 was quite elaborate 
„. , , — including two distinct movements, one for the 

Plan of the ° 

Campaign of capture of Philadelphia, and the other for the oc- 
'^^^" cupation of the line of Lake Champlain and the 

Hudson River, thus separating New England from the other 
colonies. The former operation was successfully carried out. 
Howe, commanding in person, carried a strong army on ship- 
board to the Chesapeake, and thus approached Philadelphia 
in the rear of its defences. Washington opposed him at the 
crossing of Brandywine Creek, which empties into Delaware 
Bay some distance below Philadelphia; but his position was 
turned and he was obliged to abandon the city to the British. 
Later, when a good opportunity offered itself, he surprised a 



III.] Campaign of 1777. 91 

large detachment of the British army at Germantown; but here 
again, owing mainly to misfortune, he was unsuccessful. Re- 
tiring up the Schuylkill River to Valley Forge, a strong position 
among the hills, the American army passed a terrible winter. 
But there they were drilled by Steuben and his subordinates 
until the Continental Line became an admirable force. 

The execution of the other portion of the campaign was 
intrusted to Burgoyne. It had been intended 
that Howe should co-operate with him from New c^pli'gn.^ ^ 
York. The story is related, however, that the 
orders to that effect reached New York too late, owing to Lord 
George Germaine having placed them in a pigeon-hole that he 
might attend a garden-party. At all events, Howe went south, 
leaving Clinton at New York with too weak a force to succour 
Burgoyne. At the other end of the line Sir Guy Carleton, the 
British commander in Canada, felt aggrieved at not having 
command of this expedition, and placed many obstacles in 
Burgoyne' s way. That general, after crossing the Canadian 
boundary, enjoyed a brief period of success. Driving the 
Americans under St Clair before him, he reached the portage 
between Lakes Champlain and George and the Hudson River 
without serious opposition. From that point the expedition 
was one series of misfortunes. Burgoyne occupied fifty days in 
marching seventy miles through the wilderness, the delay giving 
the New Englanders time to drop their ploughs, seize their 
muskets, and march to the Hudson. The British reached the 
river with diminished supplies. To replenish them in part and, 
also, to secure mounts for his cavalrymen, he sent five hundred 
dismounted German dragoons with a few loyalists and some 
Indians to Bennington, not far toward the east. It is probable 
that Burgoyne was led into this error by too implicit a reliance 
on a statement to the effect that numerous loyalists were 
waiting in the vicinity of Bennington for the arrival of the 
king's troops in order to show their loyalty. Indeed, it seems 



'92 Revolution. [Chap. 

that Stark's shirt-sleeved farmers were at first mistaken for the 
promised loyalists. This was not the only time in the war that 
faith in the existence of loyalists cost the British heavy losses. 

A large minority, indeed, according to some 
/^^\ writers, a majority of the people, was still loyal 

to the king — in a half-hearted sort of way. 
These were, for the most part, men of moderate views, who 
preferred remaining neutral to fighting on either side. When 
forced to take sides, they probably took part against the 
king, as their radical neighbours were nearer at hand and 
better able to annoy them than were the king's forces. On 
the other hand, if the king had shown his power to protect 
them, they would have been on his side. Of course there were 
many loyalists who devoted their lives and their fortunes to 
the king's cause; but the great mass of that party simply desired 
to be let alone. The first detachment sent by Burgoyne was 
captured by Stark and his men from western Massachusetts 
and New Hampshire (Aug. i6, 1777), who sent a relieving 
force staggering back to the main army. There is something 
almost pitiable in the fate of these heavy-armed German dis- 
mounted dragoons thus sent to their death in a wilderness. 
At about the same time, another disaster befell Burgoyne on 
his other flank. 

With a strong body of light-armed troops, St Leger marched 

from Canada to co-operate with Burgoyne by the 
St Leger's ^ q£ l^skQ Ontario and the Mohawk River. 

Campaign. •' 

Guarding the portage between the lake and the 
river stood Fort Stanwix or Schuyler, near the site of the present 
town of Rome. St Leger laid siege to this post, and defeated 
a relieving force commanded by the gallant Herkimer at Oris- 
kany (Aug. 6, 1777); but on hearing that Arnold with a strong 
detachment was marching against him, St Leger abandoned 
the siege, and retreated in all haste to Canada. These two 
disasters deprived Burgoyne of his light troops and cavalry. 



III.] Burgoyne's Campaign. 93 

Passing the Hudson, he pushed on and, advancing in three 
columns through a wilderness, he was suddenly ^^^ 
attacked with great fury by the Americans, led toga Conven- 
by Arnold and Morgan, at a clearing known as '°"' ^''''''' 
Freeman's Farm on the afternoon of September 19. Before he 
could get his army well in hand, the Americans retired to the 
main army under Gates. This general had superseded Schuyler, 
who was not trusted by the New Englanders. Gates had 
placed his army across the road, on Bemis Heights, where the 
hills come close to the river-bank. Burgoyne also placed his 
army in intrenchments. On October 7th a sharp battle was 
fought. The Americans, led by Arnold, who meantime had 
been dismissed from his command by Gates, penetrated the 
centre of the British line. That night Burgoyne retreated to 
Saratoga, but when he again reached the river he found a 
strong body of Americans posted on the other bank. Soon 
the left of the American line was extended and there was no 
alternative save surrender. On October 1 7th ( 1 7 7 7) the British 
laid down their arms and began their march to Boston. It 
would be well if the student could stop here. The Saratoga 
Convention stipulated that the British soldiers should embark 
on transports to be provided by their government, and should 
not serve again in North America until exchanged. Weakness 
or good-nature had induced Gates to grant these terms. The 
convention was not carried out in good faith by either party 
to it. The public property was not given up by the British, 
and a demand for a descriptive list of the prisoners drew from 
Burgoyne some ill-advised words, to the effect that the con- 
vention had been broken by the Americans.- These things, 
trifling in themselves, may be held, in some slight degree, to 
justify the Continental Congress in its refusal to ratify the 
convention. The real reason, however, for that action seems 
to have been a natural fear on the part of the French govern- 
ment lest the "convention troops" should be used against 



94 Revolution. [Chap. 

them in Europe. On moral grounds this action of Congress 
cannot be defended, but legally it was justifiable. 

The French monarchy now decided to take an active part 

against England in alliance with the Americans. 

Alliance, Jan.- In 1 7 76, Silas Dcane, Arthur Lee, and Benjamin 

■ '^^ ■ Franklin arrived in Paris as commissioners from 

the United States. The French government, welcoming a 
chance to injure Great Britain, lent the Americans money 
and sold them arms, munitions of war, and other military equip- 
ment. The transaction was somewhat clumsily disguised under 
the form of a business negotiation with a supposed Spanish 
mercantile firm whose only partner was Beaumarchais,'the play- 
wright. The plot was suspected by Lord Stormont, then British 
Ambassador at Paris, and the French government felt obliged 
to elude hisvigilance by placing obstacles in the way of the trans- 
portation of these supplies from the French arsenals to America. 
As an offset to the extra expense thus incurred, a million francs 
was placed in Beaumarchais's hands. The supplies procured 
in this roundabout way were of the greatest assistance to the 
Americans. Further than this, the French seemed unwilling 
to go. But when the great victory at Saratoga became known 
at Paris, all obstacles were removed. France recognized the 
independence of the United States, and (1778) concluded with 
the Americans treaties of commerce and of eventual alliance 
in case Great Britain should begin hostilities against her old 
rival. The announcement of her action was communicated 
to the British government in a manner inviting war, and 
Great Britain at once declared war against France. Lord 
Chatham proposed to withdraw the armies from America, win 
back the affection of the Americans, and together combat the 
Bourbon power. It is possible that in his hands such a policy 
might have succeeded. The king, however, refused to appoint 
him prime minister, suggesting that, perhaps, he might take 
office under Lord North ! That minister proposed to abandon 



III.] The French Alliance and Monmouth. 95 

nearly all the points in dispute, provided the Americans would 
yield on the question of independence. But the concessions 
came too late. The war continued, but from this time on, the 
British assumed the defensive in the North. 

Clinton, Howe's successor, decided to abandon Phila- 
delphia and to march overland to New York. 

^ Battle of 

Washington, on his part, determined to attack Monmouth, 
him while on the way. At Monmouth the two ^""^' ^^^^" 
armies came together. The destined commander of the 
American advance was Lafayette, but Washington against his 
will was obliged to confide it to Charles Lee, who had recently 
returned from captivity, and claimed it by right of seniority. 
Lee lost control of his men, withdrew them in disorder, and a 
disaster seemed imminent, when Washington reached the front. 
Sending Lee to the rear in disgrace, he re-established the 
battle. The British held the field, but retired during the night. 
This was the last serious engagement in the North. The British 
sent marauding expeditions along the coast, which only served 
uselessly to exasperate the inhabitants, and there were a few 
partial engagements, and one brilliant affair, the assault of 
Stony Point, by the Light Infantry under Anthony Wayne. 
The treason of Benedict Arnold, however, nearly brought 
disaster to the American cause, and resulted in the lamentable 
death of an agreeable young man, John Andre. 

Benedict Arnold, the hero of Quebec and Saratoga, was 
now in command of the most important magazine Arnold and 
and stronghold on the American side. West Point Andre, 1779. 
on the Hudson River. Burdened with debt and disaffected at 
the ungenerous treatment he had received at the hands of the 
Congress, Arnold had for some time meditated treason. He 
asked for the command of West Point that he might surrender 
something of value. Dishonourable himself, he was afraid to 
trust others, and demanded a personal interview with Clinton's 
agent, his aide-de-camp Major Andre. The interview, begun 



g6 RevoliLtio7i. [Chap. 

outside the American lines, was concluded within them, whither 
Andr6, unsuspecting danger, had been led by Arnold. He 
passed them again in disguise, under an assumed name, and 
was captured between the lines with compromising papers 
concealed in his boots. His status was inquired into by a 
court appointed by Washington, and on its report that he was 
a spy, he was executed as such. Into the legal aspects of the 
case it is unnecessary to enter here. The arguments on both 
sides are admirably set forth in the text and notes of Sir 
Sherstone Baker's edition of Halleck's International Law. 
It may be said here that Lord Mahon's description of the Court 
of Inquiry does not bear a careful examination. He stigma- 
tizes Nathanael Greene, who presided over the court, as 
ignorant of Vattel and Puffendorf, and as having " no light of 
study." As a matter of fact, there was no man in America 
who probably knew more about the usages of war than Nathan- 
ael Greene. Vattel was a book much read by the American 
leaders of that time, and the idea that Greene *' had no light 
of study " cannot be admitted for a moment, when we re- 
member his conversations with Steuben about the Latin poets. 
Lord Mahon concedes that Steuben, another member of the 
court, probably knew the usages of war, but adds that he could 
not speak English, while his colleagues could speak neither 
German nor French. He says, furthermore, that Lafayette, 
a third member of the court, though holding high rank in 
the French army, was only twenty-three years of age, and had 
not made good use of his opportunities at College. Surely 
Lafayette, who wrote and spoke English correctly, could have 
interpreted to his colleagues the sage observations of Steuben. 
As for Arnold, he received early notice of Andre's capture 
and escaped to New York (Sept. 1779). 

The whole interest of the war now centres in the South. 
Clinton probably felt that it was unwise to attempt any 
further offensive movements in the North with the inadequate 



III.] Arnold and Andre. 97 

force then at his disposal; or, indeed, with any force which 
the British government could place in America. ^, ,„ 

° ^ The War in 

He seems to have believed in the existence of the south, 
a large loyalist population in the South; and ^778-80. 
there was some foundation for this opinion, as the two parties 
were evenly balanced in some parts of that section, especially 
in the newly-settled portions of the Carolinas and Georgia. 
At all events, in the autumn of 1778, preparations for a cam- 
paign in the South were rapidly pushed forward. Two years 
earlier (1776), Clinton had commanded the land forces in an 
attack on Charleston, South Carolina, which had ended in 
failure, partly because the army had been unable to co-operate 
with the navy at the critical moment. It was now proposed to 
gain a foothold on the shores of the Savannah River first, and 
then to approach Charleston by land. The town of Savannah 
was captured in the winter of 1778-79, and maintained against 
a combined French and American force which laid siege to it 
the next year (1779). It was not until Clinton came South 
with a large army in 1780, that Charleston surrendered. The 
commander-in-chief was soon after obliged to return to New 
York to watch a large French army, under the Marquis de 
Rochambeau, which had landed at Newport in the summer of 
1780. Cornwallis was left in command in the South, and he 
was ably seconded by Lord Rawdon, afterwards Marquis of 
Hastings, and Cornwallis' s successor as Governor-General of 
India. The British cavalry was commanded by Lieutenant- 
Colonel Sir Banastre Tarleton, who in after years showed his 
capacity for war by severe strictures on the Duke of Welling- 
ton's conduct as a military commander. These three officers 
evinced more enterprise than any other British commanders 
in the whole course of the war. Cornwallis rapidly overran 
South Carolina, routed Gates and a new American army near 
Camden (Aug. 16, 1780), and began the subjugation of North 
Carolina. Hearing of the existence of a large body of loyalists 
C. A. 7 



98 Revolution. [Chap. 

in the interior settlements, he sent Colonel Ferguson, with his 
riflemen composed mainly of Northern loyalists, to beat up 
recruits in the settlements at the foot of the mountains, and 
also to disperse some parties of American troops reported to 
be in that region. The presence of this force at their very 
doors incited the hardy pioneers of Tennessee and Kentucky 
to take part in the war. Riding rapidly through the defiles 
of the mountains, these backwoodsmen suddenly appeared as 
if out of the clouds. Ferguson, hearing of their design, began 
his return march to join the main army. But it was too late. 
He was surrounded and surprised in his camp on King's 
Mountain (Oct. 7, 1780), losing his whole force and his own 
life at the same time; The pioneers, having dealt this severe 
blow, returned to their homes — almost as silently and suddenly 
as they had emerged from them. 

Not long after, Nathanael Greene took command of the 
American forces in the South. Dividing his 

Greene s _ '-' _ 

Southern Small army, he stationed himself next the main 

Campaigns. ^^^^ ^^ Cornwallis's right flank, and sent his 

able lieutenant Daniel Morgan, the hero of many hard-fought 
contests, with a thousand men to threaten Cornwallis's left 
flank. Morgan's advance became so threatening that Corn- 
wallis detached Tarleton with a well-equipped force of one 
thousand men to drive him back. He then put the main 
army in motion to cut off Morgan's retreat and prevent him 
from joining Greene. Tarleton found Morgan's army at the 
Cowpens with its back to a deep river (Jan. 17, 1781). Urging 
his men forward, without waiting to deploy, he rushed at the 
Americans, In a few minutes his force, with the exception of 
perhaps two hundred men, was killed, wounded, or captured, 
Tarleton himself barely escaping. Without losing a moment, 
Morgan began his retreat, eluded Cornwallis, and sent his 
prisoners to Virginia for safe keeping. These two disasters at 
King's Mountain and the Cowpens deprived Cornwallis of 



III.] Greene s Southern Campaign. 99 

nearly all his light troops. Realizing the seriousness of his 
position, he burned his train and all but his most necessary 
supplies, and started in pursuit of Morgan's force, now com- 
manded by Greene. Then followed one of the most interest- 
ing movements in the annals of the war. For days the two 
opposing forces seemed to be marching almost as one. In 
the end, Greene united the two wings of his army and retired 
across the River Dan into Virginia. Hastily gathering recruits 
he recrossed that river and placed his army in a very strong 
position at Guilford Court House, and there was fought one of 
the most fiercely contested battles of the war (March 15, 1781). 
Cornwallis won, as Greene retired from the field. Another 
such "victory," as Charles James Fox exclaimed, would ruin 
the British army. Leaving his wounded to the care of the 
Americans, Cornwallis marched to Wilmington, to recruit the 
strength of his soldiers and replenish his equipment. The 
interior of North Carolina was abandoned and Greene marched 
southward to the succour of the people of South Carolina. 
In that state, too, he lost several battles, but he compelled the 
evacuation of all the posts in the interior of South Carolina 
and Georgia. By the winter of 1781, Savannah and Charleston 
alone remained in the hands of the British. They, too, were 
abandoned in December, 1782. 

Few commanders have had a more difficult problem to 
solve than that which confronted Cornwallis at ^ „. , 

CornwaUis s 

Wilmington. The real objective in the Carolinas Plan of Cam- 
was Greene and his thousand regulars. But that p^'^"- 
general was already far away on his march to South Carolina. 
Cornwallis might have followed him; but the easiest and 
quickest way to reach him would be to go by water to 
Charleston. From that seaport Cornwallis could march to 
Camden and begin the campaign anew. He decided, how- 
ever, to proceed northward to Virginia. The precise reasons 
which led Cornwallis to adopt this new plan of campaign are 

7—2 



lOO Revolution. [Chap. 

not known. He may have thought that Rawdon with three 
thousand men could baffle Greene. Perhaps he realized the 
great difficulty of conquering and holding such a sparsely 
settled country as the Carolinas. We know that he deemed the 
conquest of the South impracticable as long as Virginia was in 
American hands. He, therefore, for these or other reasons, 
determined on the conquest of that commonwealth. There 
was a small British army there already, commanded by Phillips 
and the traitor Arnold. Cornwallis thought that by combining 
these troops with his own he would be stronger than any army 
the Americans could place in the field against him. Phillips 
died before Cornwallis reached Petersburg. The latter would 
have nothing to do with Arnold, and sent him back to New York. 

There was at that moment a small American army in 
Virginia, for Washington had sent Lafayette 
and Corn- with one division of the Light Infantry to 

wa IS, 17 I. capture Arnold. The great advantages which 

the topography of Virginia offers to the defending army have 
been noted above, and will be described at length when we 
come to the campaigns of 1861-65. It is enough to say here 
that Cornwallis and Lafayette with their respective armies 
marched up into the country and then marched down to the 
seaboard again. Cornwallis went into summer-quarters at Ports- 
mouth, and later, removed to Yorktown, which he strongly 
fortified, in obedience, as he thought, to Clinton's orders. 
Lafayette encamped some miles away near the junction of the 
Mattapony and Pamunkey Rivers; and this was the position 
of affairs in September, 1781. 

The French alliance had produced few advantages to the 
Americans up to that time. It had necessitated 

Siege of /^ 

Yorktown, the evacuation of Philadelphia by the British; 

^^ ^' but the attempts of D'Estaing, in conjunction 

with American armies, to capture Newport and Savannah had 
both ended in failure. In the summer of 1780 Rochambeau, 



III.] TJie York town Campaign. lOi 

with some six thousand excellent troops, had landed at Newport, 
which had previously been abandoned by the British. The 
fleet which brought him over had been immediately blockaded 
by a British squadron, and for a whole year the French army 
had remained idle at Newport to protect the shipping. Their 
presence there had been a source of great profit to the farmers 
of Southern New England, as they consumed large quantities 
of vegetables and provisions, paying therefor in specie. In 
the early summer of 1781, De Grasse, the French naval com- 
mander in the West Indies, sent word that he would sail north- 
ward with his whole fleet in July or August. Washington was 
anxious to use this force to capture New York; but De Grasse 
refused to cross the bar outside that harbour and suggested 
that some joint operation in Virginia might be possible. The 
capture of Cornwallis was therefore determined on. Masking 
their movements so completely that Clinton considered the 
siege of New York as begun, the allied armies marched past 
New York and through Philadelphia to the head of Chesapeake 
Bay, while the French fleet at Newport made good its escape 
and anchored in Chesapeake Bay without having met a British 
ship. Meantime De Grasse, sailing northward, entered the 
bay on the same day on which the allied armies approached 
the northern end of it. The British admiral in the West 
Indies was Sir George Rodney. He entertained a strong 
dislike to Clinton, and instead of following De Grasse with his 
whole fleet, he sent a small squadron under Hood to reinforce 
the British naval force at New York. The British and French 
fleets fought an indecisive action which obliged the British to 
return to New York for repairs — De Grasse returning to the 
entrance of Chesapeake Bay. The control of the sea was thus 
for a few weeks in the hands of the allies. Besieged by more 
than double his own numbers and without hope of immediate 
succour, Cornwallis,' on Oct. 17th, 1781, four years to a day 
from the surrender of Burgoyne, asked for terms of capitula- 



102 RevohLtion. [Chap. 

tion, and two days later the British army, some seven thousand 
strong, laid down its arms. This disaster brought about the 
fall of the North Ministry, and the recognition by Great 
Britain of the independence of the United States. 

The king was now forced to summon the opposition to 
The Peace ofifice and to coufide the government to the 
Negotiations, Marquis of Rockiugham, Lord Shelburne, Mr 
'^ ^~ ^' Charles James Fox and their followers who 

had opposed his policy in regard to both America and England. 
Shelburne and Fox, the two Secretaries of State, were the most 
important men in the new cabinet, managing home and 
colonial and foreign affairs respectively. Shelburne was a man 
of fair abilities but he was burdened with an unfortunate rep- 
utation for trickery and double-dealing. Of the many acts of 
bad faith with which he was charged, none was more serious 
than the "pious fraud " he was said to have committed against 
Henry Fox, the first Lord Holland, and father of his colleague 
Charles James Fox. Shelburne and Dr Franklin had been 
good friends before the war, and the former, sincerely desirous 
of bringing hostilities with America to a speedy termination, 
sent a messenger to Paris to inquire of Franklin upon what 
terms the Americans would consent to a cessation of hostilities. 
This matter coming to the ears of Fox greatly incensed him, 
for he deemed the negotiations with the United States as an 
independent nation to be within his province as Foreign 
Secretary. Shelburne maintained, on the contrary, that as in- 
dependence would be granted in the treaty the conduct of the 
negotiations belonged to him. Fox seized the opportunity 
afforded by Rockingham's death in July, 1782, to resign in 
company with Mr Burke and his other friends. Shelburne 
then became Prime Minister and the negotiations proceeded 
without causing any more friction in the cabinet. At Paris, 
affairs did not go so smoothly. The three American Com- 
missioners, who conducted this negotiation, were Dr Franklin, 



III.] The Peace Negotiatiofis, 1782-83. 103 

John Adams, and John Jay. The last named was especially 
accredited to Spain. While at Madrid, he became convinced 
that the Bourbon governments were desirous of continuing the 
war in the interests of Spain, hoping, among other things, to 
recover Gibraltar. He also discovered that they were anxious 
to restrict the limits of the United States with a view to keep- 
ing the new republic as far removed from Spain's American 
possessions as possible. He thus suspected the good faith of 
France. Franklin, however, believed in the good intentions of 
the French government toward the United States, and pointed 
out that the instructions to the Commissioners required them 
to take no important step without the knowledge of that 
government. The treaty of alliance also forbade either party 
to make a separate peace with Great Britain. In addition. Jay 
insisted that the British government must negotiate with the 
Americans as representatives of an independent power. At 
this juncture, the British authorities placed in Jay's hands what 
purported to be a letter from Barbe-Marbois, Secretary of the 
French legation at Philadelphia, to his government, protesting 
against the Americans continuing to enjoy the rights to the 
fisheries which they had enjoyed as colonists. Jay sent an 
Englishman then in Paris to warn Shelburne of the machi- 
nations of the French government. At that moment there 
seems to have been an agent of Vergennes at London who 
had been sent to communicate to the British government the 
views of the Bourbon powers. Shelburne saw that now, if ever, 
was the time to conclude a separate treaty with the United 
States, and he waived all questions of form. At this juncture 
John Adams arrived in Paris from Holland, where he had been 
negotiating a loan. He agreed with Jay, and the two forming 
a majority of the Commission, they voted to break their in- 
structions and to come to an agreement with England without 
the knowledge of France. The preliminary articles, which 
should form a definitive treaty whenever a general settlement 



104 RevohUion. [Chap. 

should be made, were signed on November 30th, 1782, the 
definitive treaty not being concluded until some nine months 
later, September 3rd, 1783. 

According to the American view, the Treaty of 1783 was 
in the nature of a partition of the British Empire. 
oi^X^"^^^^^ It followed from this, that the articles which ex- 
tended the limits of the. new nation to the Mis- 
sissippi, defined them on the north, and gave rights to the 
** fisheries" having once gone into operation could not be 
annulled by a subsequent war. The intention of the nego- 
tiators was undoubtedly to give to the United States the 
territory of the English colonies as it was understood to exist 
before the late acquisitions from France and Spain, limited, 
however, by the Mississippi on the West in accordance with 
the treaty of 1763. The northern limit was the southern limit 
of Canada, as laid down in the Proclamation of 1763; and the 
southern limit was the northern boundary of the Floridas, 
according to the same proclamation. These several boun- 
daries were described in the treaty with as much distinct- 
ness as was possible in the existing state of geographical 
knowledge. So imperfect was that knowledge that the last 
dispute arising under this instrument was not settled until sixty 
years later. Other provisions of the treaty gave rise to similar 
difficulties. Actual debts contracted before the war were to be 
considered as binding, but, as there was no central supreme 
court in the United States except for prize cases, this pro- 
vision was not enforced before the establishment of the 
government under the new Constitution. It was provided also 
that Congress should recommend to the several States the res- 
toration of property confiscated from the Loyalists. The " rec- 
ommendation " of Congress was duly made and proved to be 
entirely ineffective : the States paid no attention to it and Par- 
liament was obliged to care for the Royalists. Another clause 
obliged the British to evacuate all posts within the limits of the 



in.] The Treaty of Peace, 1783. 105 

new nation, and to carry away no private property. Many 
slaves who had congregated at New York were carried away 
at the evacuation of that port. This was justified on the 
ground that places occupied by the British army were " English 
soil " in view of the famous decision of Lord Mansfield. It 
was also contended that when slaves or any other American 
property came within the British lines in time of war such prop- 
erty became British property. This controversy was never 
adjusted as Great Britain steadfastly refused to indemnify the 
Americans for their losses. 

The peace found the people of the United States in a far 
more prosperous condition than at first sight 
would seem possible. The total population had the War in 
increased some three hundred thousand in seven '"^"ca- 
years. Of all the States, only Rhode Island and Georgia 
showed a decrease in population. The principal reason for 
this prosperity is that while the war had continued for seven 
years in the country as a whole, active operations had been 
carried on in no one portion of it for more than three years. 
First New England, then the Middle States, and finally the 
South had in turn been the seat of war. Falmouth was 
the only town destroyed during the conflict, and Boston was the 
only large town that was pillaged to any serious extent. Nor 
was the presence of the British array at a permanent station 
like that of New York, for instance, a commercial injury to 
the people of the neighbourhood. The British soldiers re- 
quired provisions and generally paid good prices for what they 
bought. As we have seen, the same may be said of the 
French army — ^its presence was a benefit to Southern New 
England. Commerce was interrupted, but the tobacco crop, 
then the most valuable single crop, was sent to market, though 
in a roundabout way. Agriculture does not seem to have 
been seriously interfered with, and agriculture was the most 
important industry of the country. Historians seem to have 



io6 Revolution. [Chap. hi. 

overlooked the part played by the American privateers-men. 
It has been stated, though on what authority is not clear, that 
as many Americans were engaged on the water as were in the 
armies on land, and we know from the rise in insurance at 
"Lloyds" that they must have been fairly successful in their 
pursuit. It should also be stated, that many manufacturing 
industries were established and profitably carried on during the 
war. The great depreciation in the currency has been often 
adverted to as showing the disastrous effect of the war on the 
people of the new States. But there is another side to this 
also. There were then few persons in the United States who 
depended upon the proceeds of invested funds. Most of the 
people lived on the proceeds of their own labour either on their 
own farms or as servants and slaves on the farms of their 
masters. The possession of more than a very small sum of 
money was unknown to the great mass of the people. Further- 
more, the depreciation of the currency was gradual and spread 
out over many transactions. It was really in the nature of a tax, 
and was the only tax which the people could be induced to pay. 
At all events, large quantities of specie were exported from 
the United States in the years immediately following the war. 
This was to pay for goods with which short-sighted English 
merchants and equally short-sighted American consignees 
glutted the markets of the country. This avalanche of British 
manufactures put an end for the time to American manu- 
facturing, and induced the people to contract debts which they 
could not pay. Then real suffering ensued. All sorts of ques- 
tionable expedients were resorted to. Repudiation of obliga- 
tions, inter-state conflicts, and local rebellions became the rule. 
The years 1783-88 have well been called "the critical period " 
in the history of the United States. But, perhaps the suffering 
of those years was necessary to "extort," as John Adams said, 
" the Constitution from the grinding necessities of a reluctant 
people." 



CHAPTER IV. 



THE CONSTITUTION. 



It has been noted in an earlier chapter how the particularist 
tendencies of the people of the several colonies „ . . 

•■^ ^ Beginning 

had prevented all the pre-revolutionary plans of of "partic- 
union from consummation. At the beginning of " a"sm. 
the actual conflict, it seemed as if this obstacle to union had 
been overcome. Patrick Henry declared that government was 
dissolved and that the rebellious colonists were in a " state of 
nature." He proposed that colonial boundary lines should be 
disregarded, and that each hundred thousand persons should 
send one representative to Congress. At the time, however, 
no means existed of determining the population of the colonies. 
It was impossible to put any such scheme into execution, or 
even to apportion the representation in Congress among the 
several States. Congress was obliged to fall back on the 
familiar local organizations, and give to each colony one vote. 
If an accurate enumeration had been practicable, it is probable 
that representation would have been arranged according to 
population or wealth, or upon some combination of population 
and wealth. Had this been done at that time, the subsequent 
history of the United States might — in all likelihood it would 
— have been very different from what it actually has been. 
Historical students generally lament this decision of the First 

107 



I08 The Constittitioit. [Chap. 

Continental Congress. They regard the particularism of a later 
day as unfortunate, for they are familiar with the evils which 
have resulted from the State-rights theories, and are given to 
attribute to particularism many evils which were the result of 
the prevalence of slave-labour in the South and of free labour 
in the North. But it may well be that the salvation of the 
country has been due to the strong local pride which prevails 
among its citizens and to their dislike of centralization. At 
the outset of the conflict the Continental Congress assumed and 
exercised many of the functions of sovereignty, and the people 
acquiesced in this assumption of authority. For example, 
Congress raised, equipped, and maintained armies; sent and 
received all diplomatic agents; and contracted debts for 
national purposes. 

In the earlier years of the Revolutionary War, the State 
^, ^ governments were formed, in compliance, it is 

The States ° . 

and the Con- truc, with the advice of Congress. As time 
federation. -^^Qxit ou and the first feeling of enthusiasm gave 

way to a sense of depression, the people of the several States 
turned to their respective local governments as representing 
the old order of things and as the organizations with which they 
had the most to do and over which they exercised the most 
effective control. The central authority of Great Britain, which 
had bound them together, no longer acted as arbiter or pro- 
tector. They determined to replace it by a central authority 
having such powers as they maintained the British government 
had possessed and no more. By the Articles of Confedera- 
tion, therefore, they limited the functions of the national 
government — the United States in Congress Assembled — and 
gave it no coercive power whatever. 

The Articles of Confederation, as the frame of government 
for the union was called, were elaborated by a 

The Articles . 

of Confedera- committee of the Congress, appointed m June, 
^'°"- 1776. They were not completed until Novem- 



IV.] The Land Cessions. 109 

ber, 1777. By that time, the reaction towards particularism 
was well advanced. Three years elapsed before the articles 
were ratified by the States, and they did not come into force 
until March, 1781. The successful prosecution of the war 
would have been very difficult had Congress been earlier limited 
in its authority. As it happened, the impulse given by the old 
Congress, feeble though it was, carried the country through 
the Yorktown campaign. The causes of this delay must be 
described at some length, because, as an indirect result of it, 
the United States as a whole became the owner of a large 
tract of land, the possession of which necessarily made strongly 
for nationalism. 

In 1783 Great Britain ceded to the United States the 
territory between the Alleghanies and the Missis- q^. .^ ^^ 
sippi. Even before the cession and regardless the National 
of historical facts and legal theories, several on^^'"- 
States put forth pretensions to an exclusive right to large 
portions of this vast domain. Many of these claims over- 
lapped, Virginia's claim covering those of three other States. 
They were based on the old colonial charters, all but one of 
which had been annulled, and on other grounds. Connecticut, 
whose charter had been annulled and afterwards re-confirmed, 
claimed a large territory west of the settlements on the Hudson. 
Massachusetts based her claim to western lands on the charter 
of 1691, which had been suspended by Parliament in 1774. 
The Carolinas claimed lands under the charters of 1663 and 
1665, notwithstanding the fact that the king had bought out 
seven of the eight proprietors in 1721. Georgia claimed under 
her charter of 1732, which had been surrendered to the Crown 
in 1 75 1, and under a further grant contained in the Proclama- 
tion of 1763. Virginia's claim was based on her charters of 
1606, 1609, and 1612, which had all been annulled in 1624, 
since which time she had been a royal province. The king 
had even granted some of the land within her charter limits, 



no The Constitution. [Chap. 

to the proprietors of Maryland, Pennsylvania, and Carolina. 
The western portion of Virginia under the charters he had dis- 
posed of by the Proclamation of 1763. Of all these claims, 
that of New York alone had no relation to royal grants. The 
Six Nations, or the League of the Iroquois, had submitted to 
the governor of New York as representative of the king. New 
York now asserted that the submission had been made to the 
colony of New York and that the State of that name was 
entitled to all the lands over which the Iroquois had ever 
exercised dominion. This territory included nearly all the land 
beween the Alleghanies and the Mississippi north of the Ohio, 
and some land south of that river. Virginia also claimed the 
lands lying north of the Ohio by right of conquest, the British 
posts in that region having been captured by an expedition 
organized and paid for by Virginia. It will be noticed that no 
State seemed to regard the Quebec Act as binding. Nor did 
any State pay the slightest heed to the Proclamation of 1763, 
except Georgia, and that only as the Proclamation added to 
her territory. Yet it must be conceded that all the lands 
claimed under the charters except perhaps those claimed by 
Connecticut and Massachusetts had reverted to the Crown 
years before. Six States — Maryland, Pennsylvania, Delaware, 
New Jersey, New Hampshire, and Rhode Island — could assert 
no title whatever to western lands unless as a part of the 
common property of the United States. Maryland was most 
seriously affected by the demands of the claimant States', 
Virginia, her southern neighbour, had already granted lands 
west of the mountains and proposed to liquidate her war 
debts and pension her soldiers by other similar grants. Mary- 
land, having no such fund at her disposal, would be obliged to 
raise money by taxation to satisfy the just demands of her 
creditors and of her veterans. It seemed not improbable that 
under these circumstances large numbers of Marylanders would 
emigrate to Virginia, and that the former State would become 



rv.] The Articles of Confederation. iir 

impoverished. Maryland, therefore, refused to ratify the Arti- 
cles of Confederation unless the States claiming lands should 
cede their claims to the United States. After a long delay, 
New York, whose title was of the weakest kind, ceded it to 
the United States. Maryland then, trusting in the goodwill 
of the other States, ratified the Articles. The claimant States 
slowly, making as good bargains as possible for themselves, 
ceded the lands to which they regarded themselves as entitled 
— Georgia's cession in 1801 being the last. In this way 
came into being the '' national domain," whose administration 
almost necessitated the continuance of a national government. 
The Articles of Confederation, thus brought into operation, 
have seldom received due consideration at the 
hands of historical writers. They have always of the Articles 
been considered from the point of view of the °^ Confedera- 

1 -1 tion. 

Constitution which came later. The Articles 
should be considered from the more historical standpoint of 
what went before. They formed an essential step in the his- 
torical process by which the American people emerged from 
the colonial stage and formed itself into a nation. The 
Articles were drafted by men who had regarded the British 
Empire as a federative union, with the loosest possible bond of 
union in the shape of a helpless executive. They sought to 
reproduce such a federation with a representative executive 
instead of a king. Such a form of government was impossible, 
but experience was necessary to convince the American people 
of the impossibility. 

The new union was in no sense a legislative union like that 
of England and Scotland in 1707. It resembled _j^ r ct rof 
more the old union of those kingdoms through the new 
a chief magistrate, only in this case the chief 2°^='""'"^" • 
magistrate was a body of men. It might well be termed, 
therefore, an executive union. The colonies had been united 
under a common executive, the British king — at least that was 



112 TJie Constitution. [Chap. 

the theory. They replaced him by a Congress composed of 
delegates from the several States, each State having one vote 
and the assent of nine States being necessary for the trans- 
action of important business. Congress furthermore was de- 
signed to act as arbiter in disputes between the several States. 
The Congress had almost no legislative power, no power to 
lay taxes, nor to regulate commerce with foreign powers or 
between the States. It could recommend legislation to the 
States and make requisitions for money. On paper its execu- 
tive powers were ample. To it belonged, for instance, the 
determination of war and peace, the regulation of the monetary 
standard, and the right to coin money. It also could exercise 
an admiralty jurisdiction; and treaties made by Congress were 
to be a part of the supreme law of the land. The weak point 
in the scheme was the absence of a sanction. Congress had 
no coercive power over individuals; it could act on individuals 
only through the State governments, and it had no power to 
coerce a State. Congress determined how much money should 
be raised for national purposes, and apportioned the amount 
among the States. It could not compel a State to pay one 
dollar; nor could it raise one dollar by an Act of Congress. 
The next few years demonstrated the viciousness of this 
system, and accordingly it was swept away and a strong con- 
solidated government established in its stead. Nevertheless, 
the establishment of the Confederation under these defective 
articles was an event of the very greatest importance. It was 
possible for the people in 1777-81 to have established thirteen 
distinct governments, the inhabitants of each State forming a 
nation. The establishment of any central government, power- 
less though that government may have been, was one of those 
steps which never can be retraced. The lines of development 
were then marked out in the direction of nationality. 

It may be asked how it happened that the control of the 
national domain remained in the hands of the United States. 



IV.] The Ordinance of I'j^'j. 113 

Why was not the territory acquired from Great Britain and 
the claimant States parcelled out among the States according 
to population or in some other ratio? In the 
first place, it would have been exceedingly dififi- Domain.^ '°"^ 
cult, perhaps impossible, to have made a divi- 
sion which would have been at all satisfactory. Moreover 
the people really seem to have had some consciousness of 
nationality. The United States was merely one portion split 
off from the British Empire. In the old empire the title to 
and the administration of ungranted lands was in the Crown. 
It was natural, therefore, that in the new republic the joint 
executive which succeeded to the other functions of the Crown 
should inherit this function also. It will be convenient to here 
trace the further history of this subject. 

By the autumn of 1784, all the States claiming lands to the 
north and west of the Ohio River had ceded their 
claims to the United States with certain excep- nance 0/1787. 
tions, as in the cases of Connecticut and Virginia. 
Congress at that time passed an Ordinance, mainly the work 
of Jefferson, providing for the ultimate formation of several gro- 
tesquely named States, as Polypotamia and Assenisippia. The 
Ordinance also contained a clause forbidding slavery in all the 
western territory after 1800. In 1787 the matter was taken 
up in earnest, owing to the persistence of a New England 
land and emigration company, which was unable to induce 
settlers to go to the new country unless they and their 
descendants should first be guaranteed full civil rights there. 
Congress, in compliance with this demand, although plainly 
nowhere vested with any such constitutional power, passed the 
well-known Ordinance of 1787, which was confirmed by the 
first Congress under the Constitution. With the exception of 
the Declaration of Independence and the Federal Constitution, 
no political instrument has produced more important results 
for the United States than has this Ordinance. As new terri- 
C. A. 8 



114 '^^^^ Constittition. [Chap. 

tory has been organized this Ordinance with the occasional 
exception of the clause forbidding slavery has been the basis 
of the territorial organization. The Ordinance of 1787 pro- 
vided a temporary government for the Territory North-west of 
the River Ohio by officials appointed by Congress. As soon as 
the settlers in the new territory should number five thousand, a 
representative legislature should be elected; and the people of 
the territory might send a delegate to Congress who, however, 
should have no vote in that body. Provision was made for 
the ultimate formation of six States out of the territory and 
they were to be admitted to the Union, on a footing of com- 
plete equality with the original States. The people of each 
State should frame a constitution for that State, which must be 
republican in form and receive the approval of Congress. The 
settlers who should go to the new territory were guaranteed civil 
rights, as, for instance, the benefits of the writ of habeas corpus, 
trial by jury, bail, and free representation in the legislature. The 
legislature was forbidden to make any laws impairing the obli- 
gation of private contracts formed previous to the passage of such 
law. It was also provided that education should be encouraged 
and the Indians properly treated. The three most important 
provisions of the Ordinance, however, and those which have 
given it a place in history, are those providing for the equal 
distribution of the estates of intestates, prohibiting the molesta- 
tion of any person on account of his mode of worship or religious 
opinions, and forbidding absolutely and for ever slavery except 
as a punishment for crime — with a provision for the rendition 
of fugitive slaves. The precise meaning and binding force of 
the Ordinance and of its several parts are questions which have 
agitated courts, both State and national, legislatures, constitu- 
tional conventions, and congresses. It has been generally held 
that these guarantees were in the nature of a compact between 
the United States and the people of the new territory, and of 
the States formed from it, and could not be abrogated without 



IV.] The Ordinance of 1787. 115 

the consent of all parties. At all events, the Ordinance pre- 
served freedom in the North-west. Furthermore, by the policy 
thus formulated, the American people, for the first time in the 
history of mankind, voluntarily promised to those who should 
form colonies in these new territories, equal rights with the 
inhabitants living in the older States. This promise has been 
rigidly adhered to, and thus the United States has grown, not 
by forming colonies according to the usual meaning attached to 
the phrase, but by absorbing into the Union States formed on 
the national domain. This process has disguised the fact that 
during the last century the United States has been the greatest 
and most successful colonizing power in the world. 

At the time of the ratification of the Articles, the complaints 
of the soldiers of the Revolutionary army were so ^ 

-' -' Congress and 

loud and threatening as seriously to menace the the Army, 
safety of the republic. The situation of the army ^^^ " ^' 
officers, and of the soldiers as well, was very distressing. They 
had abandoned their means of securing a livelihood and were 
serving their country for a compensation which did not cover 
their own personal expenses. The families of many of them 
were in great need. Under these circumstances, as early as 
1778, large numbers of the officers of the Continental Line had 
either resigned their commissions or had threatened to resign. 
This wholesale change in the personnel of the company and 
regimental officers would have been disastrous. Washington 
interfered, and exerted himself to the utmost to secure the 
adoption by Congress of some scheme of half-pay for life or of 
pensions which might induce the officers to remain in the 
service. The people, as a whole, were very jealous of the 
army. Probably they feared it. At all events. Congress no 
sooner passed a vote favourable to the soldiers than public 
opinion compelled it to annul its vote. In the autumn of 1780, 
when the army seemed to be on the point of dissolution, the 
Continental Congress promised half-pay for life to those who 

8—2 



Ii6 The Constitution. [Chap. 

should serve until the end of the war. The first Congress of 
the Confederation repudiated this action upon the unworthy- 
pretext that nine States (the number required under the Articles) 
had not voted for it. The officers then offered to compromise 
by commuting the half-pay for life to full pay for seven years. 
This was the condition of affairs in March, 1783, when an 
anonymous address was published at Newburg on the Hudson, 
where the army was encamped, callings meeting to determine 
what measures should be taken to obtain justice. Washington, 
with great tact, averted the danger by calling another meeting. 
He there met the officers and induced them to intrust their 
affairs to him. Had Washington at that time spoken the 
word, there can be little doubt that he might have played 
the part of other great commanders in civil strife and made 
himself a king. But to a suggestion of that nature he replied 
in such a manner that it was never repeated. Congress was 
now induced to grant full pay for five years in money or 
in such promises to pay as other creditors of the Confederation 
received. Towards the end of the year the army was dis- 
banded, Washington bidding farewell to his officers on 
December 14th, 1783. 

This dispute as to half-pay had run to this dangerous 
^^ ^. length because Congress had neither the means 

The Finances ° ° 

of the Con- to Satisfy the demands of the army nor any pros- 

federation, p^^^ ^j obtaining them. In 1783, the total debt 

of the United States was about forty millions of dollars, in- 
cluding nearly five millions due to the army. The annual 
interest on this debt amounted to nearly two and one-half 
millions. Of the total of forty millions, some eight millions 
were owed abroad to the French government and to other foreign 
governments and individuals. The interest on this portion of 
the debt was met by the proceeds of new loans contracted in 
Europe. The interest on the domestic debt, as that owed to 
Americans was called, was not paid at all. Between 1782 



IV.]- Weakness of the Confederation. WJ 

and 1786, Congress made requisitions upon the States to 
the amount of six millions. Of this, only one million had 
been paid up to the end of 1786, At no time in the life of 
the Confederation was Congress able to pay the running ex- 
penses of the government. This was the defect in the Articles 
of Confederation which has attracted most attention. An 
attempt was made to remedy it before the Articles came into 
operation. At that time (1781) it was proposed to give Con- 
gress the right to levy duties on imports to the extent of five 
per cent, ad valorem. But this very moderate proposal fell 
through owing to the obstinacy of Rhode Island and the 
fickleness of Virginia. At another time (1783) the suggestion 
was made that Congress should be given power to levy certain 
duties, partly specific and partly ad valorem, to be collected by 
officials appointed by the States, but responsible to Congress. 
To this proposition the people also turned a deaf ear. The 
attention of the country had been called, however, to the fact 
that there was a national debt and that there was no national 
income. 

A government so weak at home was neither feared nor 
respected abroad. Great Britain, for example, 
immediately enforced against the people of the pj°^^^^^ 
United States all the restrictions of the pre-revo- 
lutionary commercial system. The United States was helpless. 
The central government had the power to conclude treaties, 
but it had no power to regulate commerce. There were no 
restrictions on trade which its agents could offer to abandon 
as the price of reciprocity; and the Congress could not, as 
foreign nations well knew, impose any such restrictions. 
Congress, therefore, was unable to conclude a commercial 
treaty with England. Nor had it the means to compel 
obedience to treaties already in existence. 
. . Congress made the recommendation as to the Loyalists in 
accordance with the Treaty of 1783. Instead of complying 



Ii8 The Constitution. [Chap. 

with it, the States seemed to vie with one another in imposing 
new hardships on Loyalists remaining in or returning to the 
United States. This was impolitic and unjust, 
with Gre^at but it was not an infraction of the treaty. The 

Britain and clause providing that no obstacles should be 

Spain. ^ ° 

placed in the way of the collection of debts 
contracted before the war was broken again and again, and the 
central government, having no coercive power, could not en- 
force the supremacy of the treaty over State laws. On the other 
hand, the British government infringed the treaty in two im- 
portant respects. First, the posts in the North-west were not 
surrendered to the United States but were retained together 
with the profitable fur trade which had grown up about themj 
and secondly, compensation for slaves taken away at the time 
of the evacuation of New York and Charleston was refused. 
Relations with Great Britain were in this unsatisfactory state 
when the government was organized under the Constitution. 
Against Spain also there was considerable complaint. That 
power refused to recognize the 31st parallel of latitude as the 
southern boundary of the United States, and maintained that 
Florida, which had been ceded back to her by Great Britain 
at the close of the war (1783), extended as far north as the 
Yazoo River (32° 30' N. L.) as that was the northern boundary 
of West Florida during the later years of the English domination. 
Nor would Spain recognize the right of the people of the new 
nation to the free navigation of the Mississippi. Spain held 
both sides of the river, not only at its mouth, but for more than 
two hundred miles inland. This was a serious matter for the 
United States, as the inhabitants of the new settlements in 
Tennessee and Kentucky, west of the Alleghanies, reached 
tide-water most conveniently by the Mississippi route. They 
threatened to, join Spain or Great Britain unless the United 
States could protect them in the enjoyment of their rights in 
the navigation of the Mississippi. At the time, this danger 



IV-] Financial Heresies. 



119 



seemed real and great; but it is not unlikely that it was unduly 
exaggerated. 

In 1784, the imports into the United States amounted in 
round numbers to three million seven hundred 

Financial 

thousand pounds sterling. The exports during heresies, 
the same year were estimated by the same au- ^^^^-Sy. 
thority at seven hundred and fifty thousand pounds sterling. 
The balance of three million pounds was paid by the exportation 
of specie. The country was soon drained of gold and silver and 
a cry arose throughout the land for inconvertible paper money. 
In spite of the terrible disasters which paper money had wrought 
within recent years all the States, with the exception of New 
Hampshire, Massachusetts, and Virginia, issued inconvertible 
paper money. The most extraordinary fruits of this vicious 
policy were seen in Rhode Island. In that little State, there was 
a sharp line of demarcation between the " town and country, " or 
better, perhaps, between those engaged in agricultural and 
those occupied in mercantile pursuits. The farmers were in 
the majority. They secured the passage of a law entitling an 
owner of land to receive paper money from the State in ex- 
change for a mortgage on his land equal to double the amount 
of the paper money received. The merchants refused to take 
the money from the first holder and it depreciated in a few 
months to one-sixth of its nominal value. Several expedients 
were then resorted to to secure its circulation. One act obliged 
all persons to accept this currency under penalty of disfranchise- 
ment, and a fine of one hundred pounds in case of refusal — the 
case to be tried without a jury, by judges annually appointed 
by the legislature. The merchants closed their doors rather 
than do business on these terms; and, to starve them into 
obedience, the farmers withheld the produce of their farms. 
In the case of Trevett against Weeden, one of the most 
famous in the history of the country, the question was brought 
before the courts, when the judges, to their honour be it said. 



I20 The ConstitiUion. [Chap. 

declared the law to be unconstitutional, and therefore null and 
void. Then it was proposed to oblige every one to take an 
oath to support the act or to lose all civil and political rights. 
But this was farther than the people of Rhode Island were 
willing to go, and the plan was abandoned. The tendency of 
paper money to depreciate could not fail to attract attention 
even at that time, and the signers of at least one petition pro- 
posed that the rate of depreciation should be regulated in 
advance by law. 

The only thing which in any wise justified this desire for 
paper currency was the state of the coinage — if it may be 
dignified by that name. All sorts of coins were in use, " joes, " 
fips, moidores, English and French guineas, bits, 
Ccfirrage*^ ^"^^ picayuncs, and especially, Spanish milled dol- 
lars, whose nominal value was about four shil- 
lings. These coins were for the most part old and light in 
weight. Perhaps the best evidence of the debased condition of 
the coinage is to be found in the fact that the government 
officials felt obliged to clip the good coins received from 
France, before paying them out to the soldiers and other 
creditors. Congress had power to coin money under the 
Articles of Confederation, but it had no funds with which to 
buy bullion or to erect and operate a mint. It could, 
however, obtain reports from its administrative officers and 
committees of its own body. After several schemes had 
been brought to its notice, Jefferson, as chairman of a com- 
mittee to whom a plan propounded by Gouverneur Morris 
had been referred, made an elaborate report upon which the 
existing monetary system of the United States is founded. 
Jefferson proposed that a dollar of the value of the Spanish 
milled dollar should be the unit of value, and that the decimal 
system should be used in its division — each dollar containing 
one hundred cents. Morris had proposed a much more minute 
subdivision, and the large value of the cent was the weak point 



IV.] Inter-State Conflicts, \']%^-ZZ. I2I 

in Jefferson's scheme. This report was made in 1786. Noth- 
ing was done in the matter at the time, but the later coinage 
was based on the recommendations of this committee. It 
may be mentioned, as showing the conservatism of the Ameri- 
can people, that the price of goods is still estimated in some 
of the older towns at so many shillings and pence. 

The real cause of the downfall of the Confederation and the 
establishment of "a more perfect union" was 
not, however, any of the inconveniences above The Cnticai 

' ' ■' f eriod. 

noted. It is rather to be found in the conviction 
which gained ground rapidly in 1786-87 that the several States 
could not long continue on the existing basis without civil war. 
This conviction was forced on the people by a commercial war 
already in progress between several members of the Confed- 
eration, and also by a determination to resist the payment of 
debts, by force if necessary, which was shown by the people of 
some sections of the country. As each State managed its own 
commercial relations, it was natural that in a period of great 
distress the people of each State should try to protect their own 
interests, even at the expense of other members of the Con- 
federation. Two examples will best illustrate this point. To 
protect the vegetable growers of New York from the competition 
of the market-gardeners of New Jersey, the New York legislature 
passed an act levying duties on all vegetables brought into the 
State, and obliging New Jersey vessels to enter and clear as 
vessels from London and other foreign ports were obliged to do. 
New Jersey, in retaliation, levied a tax of three hundred and 
sixty ^oun^?, per annum on a lighthouse which New York had 
erected at Sandy Hook, which was within the limits of New 
Jersey. Another instance of the same inter-state rivalry was to 
be seen in the relations of Massachusetts and Connecticut. 
To protect her shipping and manufacturing interests Massa- 
chusetts passed a severe navigation act designed to keep English 
goods and traders out of that State. Connecticut thereupon 



122 TJie Constitution. [Chap. 

repealed every trade law on her statute book, thereby inviting 
foreign trade to her harbours and, owing to the facilities of 
overland smuggling, completely frustrated the policy of Massa- 
chusetts. 

The other cause, which forced on the conviction above- 
mentioned, was the determined opposition to 
Shays'sRe- ^^ payment of debts which now manifested 

bellion, 1786-87. ^ ■> 

itself in the Carolinas and in Massachusetts. 
The latter State was for the moment at the mercy of the worst 
elements of her population. It is a curious fact that all the 
small rebellions in the history of the United States have been 
the work of the tillers of the soil and not of the rabble of the 
towns. This may be accounted for by the fact that the au- 
thorities of the towns, being better provided with facilities 
for quelling disturbances, can crush an insurrection before it 
passes the mob stage. At any rate, the rebellion at this time 
(1786-87) was the work of the inhabitants of the thinly settled 
western portion of Massachusetts. Led by Daniel Shays, 
these men prevented the holding of the courts at Worcester. 
Had it not been for the prompt vigour displayed by Governor 
Bowdoin and General Lincoln, the movement might have 
assumed formidable proportions. As it was, the intrinsic im- 
portance of Shays's Rebellion was entirely overshadowed by 
the tremendous effect it produced on the public mind. It 
brought the nation to its senses, and made the formation of 
a strong government possible. The chain of events, which 
led to the holding of the Federal Convention, well illustrates, 
however, upon what extraneous circumstances the fate of 
nations sometimes depends. 

The southern boundary of Maryland, according to the 
„, ., charter of 16^2, was the southern bank of the 

The Alexan- •-' ^ 

driaandAn- Potomac Rivcr, from its mouth to its source, 
ventions,°"' That frontier was chosen probably with a view 
1785-86. tQ securing important advantages to Maryland, 



rv.] Shays' s Rebellion. 123 

whose grantee had great influence at the court of the first 
Charles. It may also have been supposed that disputes 
about the navigation of the river would be less likely to 
arise if the control of the navigation of the Potomac was in 
the hands of one colony. As the event showed, the arrange- 
ment offered unusual advantages to the illicit trader. This 
gave rise to incessant disputes and aroused great irritation 
among the people of Virginia who were much more interested 
in the navigation of the river than were the Marylanders, as the 
commerce of Maryland was mainly carried on through Balti- 
more. In 1785, through the efforts of Madison and Jefferson, 
commissioners from the two States met at Alexandria in 
Virginia to frame, if possible, regulations for the use of the 
river. They soon adjourned to Mount Vernon, Washington's 
mansion near Alexandria. Their discussions inevitably ex- 
tended to the desirability of similar navigation laws and customs 
duties for all the States bordering on Chesapeake Bay. They 
therefore submitted a supplementary report suggesting the ap- 
pointment of a joint commission every second year to consider 
and report on these and kindred topics. Washington's part in 
this proposal is not known; but he certainly approved of it. At 
that moment the people of the Middle States were disturbed 
by the commercial outlook. The Maryland Assembly adopted 
the plan and invited Pennsylvania and Delaware to join in 
appointing commissioners. In Virginia, the scheme encoun- 
tered fierce opposition. Finally, however, a resolution was 
passed inviting all the States to send delegates to a convention to 
consider the trade and commerce of the United States as a whole. 
This convention met at Annapolis in 1786. Only five States 
were represented and no New England or southernmost States 
were among them. Instead of proceeding with the business for 
which the convention had been summoned, the delegates passed 
a resolution providing for a convention to amend the Articles 
of Confederation to be held at Philadelphia in the next year, 



124 '^^^^ ConstiUttion. [Chap. 

1787. To this new convention Virginia at once appointed 
delegates. Five other States, including Pennsylvania, also 
appointed their representatives before Congress could "bring 
itself to approve the plan and to recommend the States to 
elect delegates. On the day that Congress passed this vote, 
Massachusetts joined Virginia and the other five States in 
appointing delegates. The other States now rapidly came 
into line, Rhode Island alone refusing to be represented in 
the convention. 

The Federal Convention met at Philadelphia, May 25th, 
„, „ 1787, and held daily sessions, with brief adjourn- 

Convention, ments to facilitate the work of committees, until 

^^ ''■ September 17th. Its sessions were secret, and 

it was not until its final adjournment that the people knew 
anything about the proposed change of government. For 
many years the perplexities which surrounded its deliberations 
were little understood. Indeed, it was not until 1840, when 
Madison's notes of the debates were published, that historical 
students could trace the various steps which resulted in the 
formation of the most successful written Constitution^ the 
world has yet seen. 

Few deliberative bodies have contained so many men of 

experience and knowledge. Among its members 

of the Constitu- wcrc Washington and Franklin. From Virginia 

tion and their bcsidcs Washington there also came Tames Madi- 

\work. ° •' 

son and George Mason. One misses the deft 
hand of Thomas Jefferson, who at the time was American 
Minister at Paris. Nor was John Adams, Massachusetts' 
constitutional lawyer, present, as he was Minister at London. 
But Massachusetts sent a delegation of able and experienced 
men, Gerry, King, Strong, and Gorham, who, acting under 
the stimulus of Shays's Rebellion, advocated the formation of 
a strong centralized government. Among the Pennsylvania 

1 See Appendix III. 



IV.] The Federal Convention, 1787. 125 

members were James Wilson and Robert Morris. Of the 
younger men siiould be mentioned Alexander Hamilton and 
Gouverneur Morris: — to the latter' s skill in phraseology the 
Constitution owes much of its success. The secret discus- 
sions were straightforward, earnest, and patriotic. The reader 
of Madison's Debates is impressed by the absence of a priori 
reasoning. Most of the arguments were drawn from ex- 
perience; and the Constitution, instead of having been " struck 
off at a given time from the brain and purpose of man," as 
Mr Gladstone once said, was evolved from the experience of 
the English race in the two worlds. The framers of the 
Constitution were content to lay down general rules confiding 
large discretion to the three branches of the new government. 
They recognized that they were legislating for generations to 
come; and that the Constitution should be elastic and sus- 
ceptible of many different interpretations or it would be con- 
stantly changed to suit the varying needs of succeeding 
generations. They tried, on the one hand, to make revolution 
unnecessary by providing for the amendment of the Consti- 
tution. On the other hand, the cumbersome machinery 
for securing amendments made amendments barely possible. 
Over seventeen hundred amendments to the Constitution have 
been proposed in an official manner. Of these fifteen have 
been adopted. The first ten of them, forming a Bill of 
Rights, were declared in force December 15 th, 1791. The 
Eleventh Amendment (1798) limited the power of the Supreme 
Court. The Twelfth Amendment (1804) provided a new 
method for the election of the President and Vice-President. 
The other three amendments (1865-70) were the outcome of 
the Civil War and made such changes as were necessary to 
make the Constitution the organic law of a non-slaveholding 
country. The fact that from 1804 to 1865 — a period of sixty 
years — there was no amendment made to the instrument shows 
at once its great stability and at the same time its elasticity. 



126 The Constitution. [Chap. 

Both of these qualities are due to the institution known as 
the Supreme Court more largely than to anything else,. except 
the natural conservatism of the American people. 

The colonists were not familiar with unrestricted legisla- 
tures like the British Parliament: laws passed 
Court. ^^"^^""^ by any colonial assembly might be annulled by 
the Privy Council. Nor were they acquainted 
with unlimited and irresponsible executive power: every 
colonial governor was restricted in the exercise of his authority 
by his commission and instructions and by colonial acts. It 
was therefore natural for the Constitution makers, when they 
came to provide for the executive and legislative branches of 
a consolidated government, to provide also a tribunal or 
tribunals which could review the acts of the other two branches 
of the government. The Supreme Court consists of judges 
appointed by the President, by and with the advice and consent 
of the Senate — this being the usual manner of appointment to 
all the higher administrative offices. But at the moment of 
appointment, the comparison between the judges and the other 
officials ceases. The Judges of the Supreme Court hold their 
office during good behaviour and receive salaries "which shall 
not be diminished during their continuance in office." These 
conditions apply to other judges of the United States Courts 
as well. But the Supreme Court Judges have a further pro- 
tection in the fact that the Supreme Court exists by express 
grant contained in the Constitution. All other United States 
Courts and Judges exist by virtue of Acts of Congress which 
may be repealed; and Circuit Court Judges have been 
"legislated out of office " in this manner. The Supreme Court 
Judges can be ousted from office only by impeachment, 
requiring the consent of a majority of the House of Repre- 
sentatives, and of two-thirds of the Senate. The Judges of the 
Supreme Court of the United States enjoy, therefore, a more 
secure position than any other man or body of men in the 



IV.] TJie Supreme Court. 12/ 

United States. The jurisdiction of the Court is confined to 
cases "arising under this Constitution." It has no initiative; 
nor is it consulted before the passage of a law or the per- 
formance of an administrative act. Furthermore, it has no 
common-law criminal jurisdiction, but is limited to the subjects 
mentioned in the Constitution. The Court has always regarded 
the Constitution as a fundamental law and has interpreted it as 
such. The first question to be decided in most cases, there- 
fore, is whether the Act of Congress or of a State Legislature, 
under which a case has arisen, is constitutional or uncon- 
stitutional. If the Court decides that the law is unconsti- 
tutional and therefore of no force, that is an end of the matter. 
The attentive student of the history of the United States will 
become conscious, as he proceeds in his study, that the 
Supreme Court from time to time has changed its mind. Of 
course this change must be very gradual, as in the ordinary 
course of human life the majority of the Court would change 
very slowly. The number of the judges is not mentioned in 
the Constitution. The Court, therefore, might be " swamped " 
by the appointment of more judges, provided the legislative 
and executive branches were convinced of the expediency of 
the measure. But so much veneration and respect has gathered 
about the Supreme Court that such a proceeding would be 
regarded as little short of revolution. In other respects, also, 
governmental ideas change or may change very slowly. 

This is due mainly to the varying terms of office of the 
President, of the Senators, and of the Members ^, . .,., , 

' ' stability of 

of the House of Representatives. The Repre- the Govem- 
sentatives are elected every alternate year and "'^^ ' 
serve for two years. The President is elected for four years. 
The Senators are elected by the State legislatures for the still 
longer term of six years. Moreover one-third of the Senate is 
renewed each second year. Thus it often happens that the 
President and one house of Congress will belong to one party, 



128 The Co7tstitution. [Chap. 

while the other house will be in the hands of the opposition. 
It has frequently happened that the President has belonged 
to one party and the majority in both houses of Congress to 
the other. Up to the present time it may be said that these 
things have all acted to increase the stability of the govern- 
ment and to prevent inconsiderate legislation. For it is 
evident that the Senate stands between any sudden desire for 
legislation of a particular kind and the fulfilment of the 
desire. If, however, the people continue to desire certain 
measures passed, the Senate in time will surely come to the 
same way of thinking. 

The government established under this Constitution proved 
to be unusually strong from the very beginning, 
of the new Many things tended to produce this strength. 

Government. Amoug the rest, the wide scope of the grant of 
power to the national legislature. The best way to understand 
this grant of power is to turn to the Constitution, Article i, 
Section 8. The first clause of that section reads as follows: 
" Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, 
imposts, and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the 
common defence and general welfare of the United States." 
Passing over the remainder of the section one comes to the last 
clause which authorizes Congress " to make all laws which shall 
be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing 
powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the 
Government of the United States, or in any department or officer 
thereof." It must be plain, no matter what construction the 
Supreme Court placed on the words, that laws "necessary and 
proper " to provide for the levying of " taxes, ... to provide for 
the general welfare " cover an enormous field. The Supreme 
Court, moreover, has interpreted the phrase " necessary and 
proper " in a very broad manner, and thus Congress has exer- 
cised most important functions, many of which may never have 
occurred to the members of the Federal Convention. 



IV.] The President. 129 

The United States government is often spoken of as if the 
executive, legislative, and judiciary were distinct 
branches. As a matter of fact this is not true powers!°" °^ 
of the first two of the three branches. The 
President is the chief executive officer of the nation. But he 
also enjoys great legislative power, as by his veto he can compel 
a reconsideration of any act of Congress; but an act which 
commands a two-thirds majority at this second consideration 
becomes law without the President's consent. Furthermore, 
the President shares a considerable portion of his executive 
powers with the Senate. Thus no treaty can be ratified with- 
out the consent of two-thirds of the Senators present, at the 
time the vote is taken. The consent of the Senate is also 
necessary to all appointments to the higher offices. 

The President in other respects possesses ample powers. 
He acts on his own responsibility. He may 
consult the heads of departments, but need not dent of the 
follow their advice. At his inauguration he takes United 

° States." 

an oath prescribed in the Constitution to pre- 
serve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United 
States." The President is the "Commander-in-Chief of the 
army and navy of the United States, and of the militia of 
the several States, when called into the actual service of the 
United States." He must take care that the laws be "faith- 
fully executed " and he has power to grant pardons for 
"offences against the United States, except in cases of im- 
peachment." In time of war, especially of civil war, the powers 
exercised by the President as Commander-in-Chief — for the 
defence of the Constitution — may be those of a dictator. For 
instance, it was by virtue of these "war powers" that Presi- 
dent Lincoln freed all the slaves in the portions of the 
United States then in insurrection. Indeed, it is difficult to 
conceive of a limit to the power of a President in sudden 
emergencies, as when, for example, the "faithful execution" 
C. A. • 9 



130 TJie Constitution. [Chap. 

of the laws is interrupted by a mob. Furthermore, in the 
exercise of these powers, the question of the jurisdiction 
of the United States and of the several States does not arise. 
Persons obstructing the execution of the laws of the United 
States are amenable to the United States — be they State 
governors or railroad employees — and the President, for the 
defence of the Constitution, concerns himself with the indi- 
vidual and not with the State. 

An attempt was made in the Constitution, however, to 
Feder 1 nd Separate the functions of the United States and 
State jurisdic- of the Several States. To this end the States 
were forbidden (Article i. Section lo) to have 
any negotiations with foreign States, coin money, make any- 
thing except gold and silver a "tender in payment of debts," 
pass any law "impairing the obligation of contracts," etc. 
Congress (Section 9) is also forbidden to perform many acts, 
one or two of which we shall notice hereafter. 

Like all great political settlements, the Constitution was 

largely the result of compromises. Three of 

The Com- thesc Compromises are of great importance and 

promises. ^ ° ^ 

require some detailed description. At first it 
was proposed that the representation in both houses of Con- 
gress should be apportioned according to wealth. This was to 
avoid one of the great faults of the existing system which gave 
to the small States, Delaware, for instance, an equal voice with 
the large States like Virginia or Pennsylvania. Naturally, the 
delegates from the small States disliked this radical departure. 
The matter was settled by giving each State equal representation 
in the Senate, and providing for an apportionment of represen- 
tation in the lower house according to population. But when 
it came to the question of apportioning taxation, the Southern 
members contended that as slave labour was less productive 
than free labour, taxes should not be apportioned according to 
population, but according to some other ratio. Finally, it was 



IV.] The Adoption of the Constitution. 131 

agreed to count slaves at three-fifths only of their number in the 
apportionment both of representation and direct taxation. 

The other question also turned on slavery. The North was 
desirous that the new federal erovernment should 

° The regula- 

have power to regulate commerce. The South tion of com- 
hesitated to give this power to Congress lest it ™^^'^^- 
should be used to prohibit the slave-trade. In the end it was 
arranged by giving Congress power over commerce, except that 
the slave-trade might not be prohibited before 1808. It 
remains only to note that one of the final clauses (Article vi) 
declares that the Constitution and the laws and treaties made 
in pursuance thereof "shall be the supreme law of the land." 
When read in connection with the preamble : " We the people 
of the United States ... do ordain and establish this Constitu- 
tion," the supremacy of the United States over the States 
under the Constitution is apparent. 

The Federal Convention had been authorized by Congress 
to amend the Articles of Confederation. They 
had exceeded this commission, and the Consti- ^ ^°.'''" °^ '■^^'" 

ncation. 

tution, therefore, as it came from the Convention, 
was scarcely more than a plan for a new government proposed 
by a most respectable body of private gentlemen. It derived 
no binding force whatever from their action. They proposed 
that it should be submitted to the people of the several States 
by the legislatures thereof, and that, when nine States should 
have ratified it, it should be established between them. The 
constitutional position of the Constitution, if one may use 
the phrase, was so admirably described by Mr Madison that 
it will be well to read his words: "The Constitution as it 
came from the Convention," he said in 1796, "was nothing 
more than the draft of a plan; nothing but a dead letter, until 
life and validity were breathed into it by the voice of the people 
speaking through the several State conventions which accepted 
and ratified it." 

9—2 



132 The Constitution. [Chap. 

The action of the Federal Convention was no sooner known 
„ .J. . than two parties were formed, those favouring 

of the Consti- the new form of government calling them- 
*"*'°"' selves Federalists, their opponents being known 

as Anti-Federalists. This nomenclature was not always an 
accurate description of the contending parties. Patrick Henry, 
for example, opposed the adoption of the Constitution on the 
ground that the government to be organized under it would be 
a consolidated government and not a federal government at all. 
He was in favour of the establishment of a federal government. 
The issue, however, was really between the adoption of this 
constitution or anarchy, although to many persons at the time 
it seemed to be a contest between those favouring aristocracy 
and those favouring democracy. The Confederation could not 
last much longer. This being the case the people reluctantly 
assented to the Constitution, many of the State conventions 
proposing amendments. The papers teemed with articles for 
and against ratification. The ablest for the adoption of the 
plan were from the pens of Alexander Hamilton, James Madi- 
son, and John Jay. These were gathered into a more perma- 
nent form in a book entitled the Fcederalist which remains 
the best commentary on the Constitution. This is the more 
remarkable, as Hamilton, the principal writer of these essays, 
had little faith in the Constitution as it was adopted, but de- 
sired a much stronger form of government. On the other side 
the most instructive papers were Richard Henry Lee's Letters 
of the Federalist Farmer, and the speeches delivered by Patrick 
Henry in the Virginia Ratifying Convention — the latter may be 
found in Eliott's Debates or in Henry's Life of Patrick Henry. 
The ratification of the ninth State, New Hampshire, was 
made on June 21st, 1788. A few days later Virginia ratified, 
the messengers conveying the respective tidings 
The first ten passing cach Other on the banks of the Potomac. 

Amendments. ^ ° 

Preparations were immediately made for the 



IV.] The First Presidential Election. 133 

organization of the new government. The first ten amend- 
ments, declared in force in 1791, made good most of the 
defects complained of by those opposed to ratification. It 
will be well, therefore, briefly to notice them here. The 
changes are all in the nature of limitations on the power of 
Congress. For example, Congress is now forbidden to make 
laws " respecting an establishment of religion," or abridging the 
freedom of the press. Another clause prohibits general war- 
rants. Other amendments secure jury trial, prohibit excessive 
bail and cruel or unusual punishments. The most important 
perhaps are the ninth and tenth amendments to the effect that 
the " enumeration ... of certain rights shall not be construed 
to deny or disparage others retained by the people," and re- 
serving to the States or to the people "powers not delegated 
to the United States by the Constitution nor prohibited by it 
to the States." 

There could be no question as to the first President, and 
Washington received the unanimous vote of all 
the electors. As to the Vice-Presidency, there anTAdImS°" 
was no such unanimity of opinion. John Adams 
of Massachusetts was the leading candidate. But he had lived 
long abroad and had given great offence by using the phrase 
"well-born " in a book written in defence of the State Consti- 
tutions. It was feared that he might have become enamoured 
of English institutions. The mode of election of President 
and Vice-President prescribed by the Constitution was found to 
be faulty. Electors were to be chosen in the several States who 
should, on a given day, vote by ballot for two persons, one of 
whom should not be an inhabitant of the same State as the 
elector. The person receiving the largest number of votes 
(provided it was a majority) should be President, the second 
on the list should be Vice-President. Hamilton, fearing lest 
Adams should receive more votes than Washington, intrigued 
with some of the electors to induce them to cast one of their 



134 -^-^^^ Constitution. [Chap. iv. 

votes for some person other than Adams. Probably Hamilton 
had no sinister intentions in taking this action. But it came to 
the ears of Adams and gave him a distrust of Hamilton, which 
bore bitter fruit some ten years later. Notwithstanding its 
defects, this continued to be the method of choosing President 
and Vice-President until 1804 (see below, p. 157). 




Scale of Eug'lish Miles 



so lOO 200 ^ 300 



MAI* 11. T<) IM.IJSTUATE CHAPTERS V IX 




NOTES TO MAP II. 

pgbedhxzh'r. Original boundary of the United States according to 
the Treaty of 1783 (p. 102 and Map I). 

p g b e. This boundary was determined in 1842 as marked g e. The hne 
contended for by the British crossed Maine a little to the north of the 
46th parallel. The American claim is shown by line g b e. (See 
p. 224 and Map I.) 

d h. The line according to the treaty was to run due west from the Lake 
of the Woods to the Mississippi. 

XZh'l. Spain claimed as far north as 3^° 30', between the Mississippi 
and Chattahoochee rivers, but abandoned her claim by treaty in 1795. 

S V a' b' c d' d h X z h' p'. For the limits of Louisiana, see p. 166 and 
foil. 

O X Z 0. Seized by the United States in 1810 (p. 183). 

Z b' p'. Seized by the United States in 1812 (p. 183). By the treaty of 
1819 with Spain, the United States acquired a clear title to the 
peninsula of Florida and to all land east of the Mississippi and south 
of X z b' r. The United States abandoned all claim to lands south of 
the line n a' m b' 1 and Spain ceded whatever rights it possessed to 
land north of this line to the United States (p. 198). 

Texas. The southern boundaiy of the State of Texas as one of the Mexican 
States was ai little to the south of the Nueces River. The portions 
of the territories, of New Mexico and Kansas to the south and east of 
lines V a' n were ceded to the United States by Texas in 1850 (p. 228). 

t u a" V B. Boundary between the United States and Mexico by the Treaty 
of Guadalupe Hidalgo, 1848. 

a"" u a" V a'". The "Gadsden Purchase " 1853. 

d d' c. Northern limit of the United States by Treaty of 1818 (p. igS). 

C b a. Northern limit of United States west of the crest of the Rocky 
Mountains, according to the Oregon Treaty, 1846, as interpreted by 
the German Emperor, 1871 (p. 236). 






NOTES TO MAP II. 

Pffbcdhxzh'r. Original boundary of the United States according to 

the Treaty of 1783 (p. 102 and Map I), 
p g b e. This boundary was determined in 1842 as marked g e. The line 

contended for by the British crossed Maine a little to the north of the 

46th parallel. The American claim is shown by line g b e. (See 

p. 224 and Map I.) 

d h. The line according to the treaty was to run due west from the Lake 
of the Woods to the Mississippi. 

X Z h' r. Spain claimed as far north as 32° 30', between the Mississippi 
and Chattahoochee rivers, but abandoned her claim by treaty in 1795. 

S V a' b' c d' d li X z b.' p'. For the limits of Louisiana, see p. 166 and 
foil. 

X Z 0. Seized by the United States in 1810 (p, 183). 

OZh' p'. Seized by the United States in 181 2 (p. 183). By the treaty of 
1819 with Spain, the United States acquired a clear title to the 
peninsula of Florida and to all land east of the Mississippi and south 
of X z b' r. The United States abandoned all claim to lands south of 
the line n a' m b' 1 and Spain ceded whatever rights it possessed to 
land north of this line to the United States (p. 198). 

Texas. The southern boundary of the State of Texas as one of the Mexican 
States was ailittk to the south of the Nueces River. The portions 
of the territories of New Mexico and Kansas to the south and east of 
lines V a' n were ceded to the United States by Texas in 1850 (p. 228). 

t u a" V 3. Boundary between the United States and Mexico by the Treaty 
of Guadalupe Hidalgo, 1848. 

a"" u a" V a'". The " Gadsden Purchase " 1853. 

d d' c. Northern limit of the United States by Treaty of 1818 (p. 196). 

c b a. Northern limit of United States west of the crest of the Rocky 
Mountains, according to the Oregon Ti-eaty, 1846, as interpreted by 
the German Emperor, 1871 (p. 236). 



CHAPTER V. 



THE NEW NATION. 



Slowly, as befitted the successor of the Confederation, the 
new governmental organization came into exist- 

Washinsf" 

ence — the moribund Congress of the Conf edera- ton's first in- 
tion prolonging its existence, that there might be auguration, 
no break in the continuity of the lives of the two 
federal organizations. Finally, however, the two Houses of 
Congress met, the electoral vote was counted, and Washington 
was inaugurated as the first President of the United States (April 
30th, 1789). This first inauguration was a simple and impres- 
sive ceremony. English customs and traditions were the rule for 
ceremonial and social intercourse in those early days. Wash- 
ington had been accustomed to the glitter and pomp of the 
little court of the Governor of Virginia; and he seems to have 
believed that a limited appeal to men's senses in matters of 
dress and ceremonial was good in itself. At all events, the new 
government began its career with a solemn stateliness, well 
suited perhaps to the grandeur of the enterprise and to the 
character of its first chief; but which, before many years, 
proved to be distasteful to many voters. As an example of this 
adherence to custom, may be mentioned the speeches with 
which the first two Presidents were accustomed to open the 
sessions of Congress — after the manner of opening Parliament. 
The custom was also followed of the two Houses presenting 

135 



136 The New Nation. [Chap. 

addresses in answer to the speech, to which the President 
replied in a few words of thanks. As has been the case in 
England, it not infrequently happened that two, perhaps even 
all, of these documents were the work of the same ready penman. 
Then, again, Washington, unlike later Presidents, refused to be 
shaken by the hand, but holding his right hand behind him, he 
bowed stiffly to those who paid their respects to him. These, 
and other things which savoured somewhat of royalty, were 
unfortunate, in that they gave colour to the charge — entirely 
without foundation so far as Washington and Adams were 
concerned — of a design to introduce a monarchical form of 
government. Washington might well have been pardoned if 
his head had been turned. His birthday was celebrated as a 
holiday. As he travelled through the country in the recesses 
of Congress, he was greeted at one place as "Columbia's 
Saviour," and sped on his way at another with cries of "God 
bless your reign." Washington, in 1789, was in no sense a 
party man. He had been chosen to his high office by the 
unanimous suffrage of the whole nation. He desired to heal 
the wounds which the sharp contest over the ratification of the 
Constitution had made, and to interest the best men of all 
shades of opinion in the success of the new government. 
Franklinwas now an old man. John Adams was Vice-President, 
John Jay became the first Chief-Justice of the United States, 
and James Madison at this time was most usefully employed 
as administration leader in the House of Representatives. The 
most prominent man not in political life was Thomas Jefferson, 
Minister to France, but now at home on a leave of absence. To 
him, Washington offered the foremost place in the administra- 
tion, the Secretaryship of State, which Jefferson accepted. 
Born in 1743, Jefferson was now in the prime of life. His 
political theories, formed in the heat of the con- 
Thomas ^gg^. ^^-^^ ^^ mother-laud, were the same in 1 790, 

Jefferson. -^ 

1798, and 1S25 that they were in 1774 and 1776. 



v.] Jefferson and Hamilton. 137 

A sublime faith in humanity and a firm reliance on the ultimate 
judgment of the people made him the expounder of the princi- 
ples of democracy in the crises of 1776 and 1798. The means 
adopted by Jefferson to secure his ends were often repellent in 
the extreme; but this should never blind one to the ends for 
which he was working. Jefferson had been in France during 
the recent years (1781-87) of weakness and disaster which had 
converted so many men, Gerry and Madison, for instance, to 
the cause of strong government. On the contrary, an intimate 
contact with the French Revolution in its earlier and better 
period had served to confirm him in the opinion that "govern- 
ment derives its just powers from the consent of the governed." 
Opposed to Jefferson in every way was Alexander Hamilton, 
once Washington's aide-de-camp and now Secre- 
tary of the Treasury and the busiest man in the Hamm"^^' 
administration. Hamilton was younger than 
Jefferson, being at this time about thirty-three years of age. 
He was a native of the British West Indies, and found his way 
to New York in search of an education. The traditions of 
colonial institutions, so far as they departed from English pre- 
cedents, had had slight influence on him. Like Jefferson, he 
had made up his mind on political subjects at an early period, 
and the events of 1781-87 had only strengthened his a priori 
theories. While only twenty-two years of age, he had written 
to Robert Morris, then at the head of the financial administra- 
tion, proposing to enlist the influence and interest of men of 
position and means in the success of the Revolution. He 
proposed to accomplish this by means of a loan and a national 
bank. This was Hamilton's position ever afterwards. The 
following sentences, culled from speeches he made in 1787, 
will further elucidate his political opinions. Among "the 
essential principles necessary for the support of government," 
he numerated (i) "the love of power"; (2) "force, by which 
may be understood a coercion of laws or a coercion of arms"; 



138 The New Nation. [Chap. 

(3) " influence," — by which he did not mean corruption, but a 
dispensation of those regular honours and emoluments which 
produce an attachment to the government. Nevertheless he 
quoted, with apparent approval, a statement which he attrib- 
uted to Mr Hume, " that all that influence on the side of the 
Crown, which went under the name of corruption, was an 
essential part of the weight which maintained the equilibrium 
of the [British] Constitution." To Hamilton, a government by 
classes was the best possible form, and the British government, 
as it existed in 1787 before the days of the Reform Acts, "was 
the best in the world ; and he doubted much whether anything 
short of it would do in America." To him "the people," to use 
his own phrase, was "a great beast." In 1802, not long before 
his unhappy death, he wrote to Gouverneur Morris, " Every day 
proves to me more and more, that this American world is not 
meant for me." The opportunity was now given him to enlist 
the influence and interest of the moneyed classes in the success 
of the new government. As the ablest man among the advo- 
cates of a strong government, Hamilton became the leader of 
the Federalists, as the party favouring centralization was still 
called. Jefferson, in a short time, began the formation of a party 
devoted to the spread of democracy. He was forced to rely 
on the advocates of particularism and thus became the champion 
of the State-rights doctrine. Some writers think that even then 
there was nothing incompatible between nationality and demo- 
cracy ; but it was not until the formation of the present Republican 
party that the two formed the basis of a political organization. 
Even before the inauguration. Congress began the arduous 
_ . ^. task of establishing the public credit. The treas- 

Organization ° ^ 

of the Govern- ury was empty and it was important to begin the 
'"^^ ■ collection of taxes with the least possible delay. 

On April 8th, 1789, two days after the appearance of a quorum 
of both Houses made Congress a legal body, Madison intro- 
duced a resolve which gave rise to the first tariff debate, and 



v.] Organization of the Government. 139 

to the first enunciation bythenational legislature of a protective 
policy. The rates provided in this first tariff act were very 
low. This was due partly to the inexperience of the legislators, 
but more especially to a feeling, bred by the history of the 
Confederation, that it would be impossible to collect more. 
Subsequent acts increased the rates to a more remunerative 
figure. Ill-designed as the first tariff act undoubtedly was, the 
intention of the framers was to establish a protective system, 
as may be seen from the preamble, which reads as follows : 
"Whereas it is necessary for . . . the encouragement and pro- 
tection of manufactures. " This Act and a Tonnage Act, which 
was passed soon after, provided for a discrimination in favour 
of goods imported in vessels owned and manned by citizens 
of the United States, and levied duties which practically excluded 
foreign vessels from the coasting trade. It was also proposed 
to discriminate between vessels flying the flag of countries 
having commercial treaties with the United States, and those 
of countries which had no such treaty relations, but this scheme 
was not carried out. Congress then provided the machinery 
for carrying on the great departments of the government, con- 
tinuing in most cases the existing system, but substituting 
single departmental heads for the bureaus then in existence. 
The Federal judiciary was also organized. The Supreme 
Court consisted of the Chief Justice and five Associate Justices. 
Thirteen District Courts, each presided over by a District 
Judge, were established. The country was furthermore divided 
into three circuits, with courts to be held by a justice of the 
Supreme Court and the judges of the district courts within the 
limits of the circuit. The jurisdiction of these courts was 
defined and all necessary arrangements were made for the 
effective working of the system. Congress also determined 
what the salaries of the officers of the new government should 
be. The President's salary was fixed at twenty-five thousand 
dollars a year, at which sum it remained until 1873, when it 



140 The New Nation. [Chap. 

was doubled. The President, in addition, has always had a 
furnished house provided at the national expense, and from time 
to time household officers, with salaries paid out of the treasury, 
have been provided. The salaries of the other high officers 
were arranged on a very moderate basis. The Vice-President 
was given five thousand dollars (^1,000), the Chief Justice four 
thousand, the Associate Justices and the Secretaries of State 
and of the Treasury thirty-five hundred each. The members 
of the two Houses were paid six dollars a day for each day's 
service, with mileage allowance to and from the seat of govern- 
ment. The Senators had very high ideas of the dignity of 
their positions, and endeavoured to secure a higher rate of pay 
than that given to the Representatives. The matter was com- 
promised by a provision that after March 4th, 1791, they should 
receive seven dollars instead of six. But when that time came, 
the popular branch of Congress had acquired so much strength 
that the discrimination was repealed. The Senators were also 
anxious to provide high sounding titles for the chief officers. 
It was proposed, at one time, that the President should be 
addressed as "His Highness, the President of the United 
States of America, and Protector of their Liberties." Eventually, 
the constitutional style of " President of the United States " 
was adopted. The Senators, however, for a while addressed 
one another as "Most Honourable," but that, too, was soon 
dropped. Curiously enough, some State governors, lieutenant- 
governors, mayors of cities, and other lesser functionaries have 
retained the old colonial titles of "His Excellency," "His 
Honour," and the like. 

It was during the second session of the first Congress that 
.,^ , the elements of discord and party division began 

Hamilton's f j o 

financial to show thcmselves. Hamilton presented an 

^°'"^^" elaborate report on the public debt, and made 

certain recommendations as to the best method of funding it. 
It appeared from this report that the United States owed over 



v.] The State Debts. 14 1 

fifty-four millio-n dollars. Of this, eleven millions were owed 
abroad, a«d these obligations were usually spoken of as the 
" foreign debt. " It was agreed that this must be paid according 
to the terms of the original contracts. As to the "domestic 
debt, " as that owed to citizens of the United States was called, 
there was much division of opinion. This debt included the 
original principal of over twenty million dollars and overdue 
interest of more than thirteen millions. Hamilton proposed to 
fund this portion of the debt at par in obligations of the new 
government. This was strongly opposed by many members of 
Congress. The debt had depreciated to about one-fifth of its 
original value, and it was argued that to pay the present holders 
of the debt a dollar for what had cost them twenty cents was 
not only an uncalled for act of generosity, but would wOrk 
great injustice to many original holders of the certificates. 
Madison proposed an equitable but probably impracticable 
scheme. It was, in brief, that the present holders should 
receive the highest market price, and the balance, amounting 
to more than one half of the whole, should be paid to the 
original creditors. This scheme, however, would have required 
as much money as Hamilton's, and would not have established 
the public credit on such a good foundation, and the Secretary's 
plan was adopted. 

Hamilton had further proposed that the debts incurred by 
the States in the prosecution of the war should . 

^ Assumption 

be assumed and funded by the general govern- of the state 
ment. This part of the plan aroused fierce ^^*^" 
opposition. It happened that there were great inequalities in 
the proportional amounts of the State debts. On the one hand, 
some States had made greater sacrifices than others; and, on 
the other hand, some States had enjoyed exceptional advantages 
inpayingoff their debts. These two causes combined, in many 
different ways, to produce the result that the Northern States 
had larger debts to be assumed than the Southern States. The 



142 The New Nation. [Chap. 

interests of the two sections were therefore different. The 
leading motives in Hamilton's mind in proposing his plan 
were the desirability of interesting as many persons as possible 
in the stability of the government, and of concentrating the 
sources of revenue in the hands of the central authority. 
But these reasons, which served to commend the measure to 
Hamilton, only made it more distasteful to the Southerners, 
who generally wished for as weak a national government as 
was compatible with safety. So many interests combined 
against the plan of assuming the State debts that it was 
defeated for a time. 

While the contest over this measure was in progress, 
Contest as to ^^lother Struggle, also arousing bitter sectional 
thenationai feeling, was going on. This was the deter- 

capi a . mination of the permanent seat of the national 

government. The Constitution provided that the federal 
government should have complete control over a district of not 
more than ten miles square, within which a national capitol 
and other government buildings should be built. The question 
as to the precise location of this little district, and of the 
temporary seat of government while the necessary buildings 
were being erected, seems now-a-days to be a matter of small 
moment; but at the time it aroused great interest. Congress 
was then sitting at New York, which was undoubtedly very 
inconvenient for the Southerners. They wished the permanent 
capital to be placed on the Potomac, and the Pennsylvanians 
desired that Philadelphia should be the temporary capital. 
Sectional pride and convenience influenced the Southern men, 
but the Pennsylvanians seem to have been actuated by pecuniary 
reasons alone. The Northerners, who cared little for this 
matter and a great deal about assumption, believed that the 
Pennsylvanians, whose votes had defeated that measure, had 
made a bargain of some kind with the South. They, therefore, 
secured the substitution of Baltimore for Philadelphia as the 



v.] The First Slavery Debates. ■ 143 

temporary capital, and this measure came to a sudden stop 
also. At this juncture, Hamilton approached Jefferson, who 
had not then made up his mind as to his future course, and 
suggested that they should bring about a compromise. In the 
end, Jefferson secured the change of enough Southern votes to 
carry assumption, and Hamilton provided votes to carry the 
Potomac-Philadelphia scheme, and both plans passed into law. 
Meantime, another debate had initiated the discussion of 
the most burning question of all, slavery. The th fi t 
matter had been brought up first in Congress by slavery de- 
a Virginia member, who proposed that Congress 
should exercise its constitutional right and levy a tax on all 
slaves imported into the country. The political leaders of 
Virginia at that time were in favour of the abolition of slavery, 
but did not know how to bring it about. The representatives 
from the States south of Virginia felt no scruples as to the 
rightfulness of slavery. On the contrary, they justified it out of 
the Bible. They also considered that Virginia was not alto- 
gether disinterested in making this proposal, as in all likelihood 
she would be called upon to produce slaves for sale in the 
southernmost States after the abolition of the slave-trade 
should have closed the existing source of supply; and this 
was precisely what happened. The matter was then dropped 
in consideration of Southern votes in favour of the protective 
tariff] and, as a matter of fact, no tax was ever imposed 
on imported slaves. The next time the subject of slavery 
came before Congress, it appeared in a form much more 
offensive to the slave-owners. In 1790 petitions were pre- 
sented from the Quakers and from the Abolition Society of 
Pennsylvania, whose president was Benjamin Franklin. These 
two very respectable bodies prayed Congress to exercise what- 
ever power the Constitution gave it "to promote mercy and 
justice " toward the negro. The violence of the language 
used by the slave-owners' representatives was extraordinary, 



144 "^^^^ New Nation. [Chap. 

and was scarcely exceeded in the whole course of the slavery 
struggle. But the Southerners scented danger, and the debate 
occurred when they were already exasperated by the discussions 
of the assumption and national capital schemes. Ultimately, 
after careful consideration by a large committee, a few very 
mild statements were entered on the Journal of the House and 
the matter dropped. In some measure as an outcome of this 
discussion. North Carolina stipulated, in her cession of claims 
to western lands, that no regulations looking towards the 
abolition of slavery in that district should at any time be made 
by Congress. In 1792, Kentucky was admitted to the Union 
as a slave State; in this way the Ohio River, forming the 
boundary between that State and the territory north-west of 
the River Ohio, separated the slave and free territories between 
the Alleghanies and the Mississippi — with the trifling exception 
of a small triangular district known as the "Virginia Pan- 
handle." 

The third session of the First Congress was held at Phila- 
delphia (Dec. 1 790-Mar. 1 79 1) . Two measures, 
The Excise, passcd at this time, aroused much opposition and 
brought about the permanent separation into the 
two great political parties which may be considered to have 
been in existence at the time of its final adjournment (1791). 
These two measures were the Act levying an excise tax and the 
Act incorporating the first Bank of the United States. Assump- 
tion had commended itself to Hamilton because it would 
necessitate the levying of an excise tax, and, in this manner, 
transfer a great part of the taxing power and machinery from 
the States to the federal government. The tax as proposed 
would be as inoffensive as such a tax could well be, but its 
enforcement would require inquisitorial methods and the net 
proceeds would be small in comparison with the amount laid 
out in salaries and other government expenses. As a matter of 
fact, it caused a small insurrection in western Pennsylvania, 



v.] The Excise and the Bank. 145 

which cost the government more than the net proceeds of the 
tax for several years. It was finally voted, in spite of the 
protests of the legislatures of several of the Southern States. 
The issue here was mainly one of expediency. The questions 
involved in the Bank Charter were questions of interpretation 
of the Constitution, and went to the very bottom of the whole 
form of the new government. 

Hamilton desired the formation of a national bank, re- 
sembling in many ways the Bank of England, 
which had been in successful operation for nearlv ^J^^ Umted 

^ ■' states Bank. 

a century. Such an institution would be a con- 
venient resource for temporary loans and, through the branches 
which could be established in different parts of the country, 
would be of great assistance in collecting the taxes and in making 
the necessary disbursements. Furthermore, as a large proportion 
of the stock could be paid for in United States bonds, the market 
price of those bonds would probably reach par. Hamilton 
also thought, in all probability, that the bank would aid in the 
policy of attaching the moneyed interests of the country to the 
national government. He believed the measure to be a con- 
stitutional one because a national bank was "necessary and 
proper " to the successful administration of the finances of the 
country. Jefferson, on the other hand, protested against the 
whole scheme. He felt that its adoption would increase the 
power and prestige of the national government. He disliked 
it also because he thought the Constitution should be strictly 
construed, and that nothing should be done by the national gov- 
ernment which was not directly authorized by that instrument, 
since all powers not delegated were reserved to the States 
or to the people. Thus the question of a strict or a liberal 
construction of the Constitution arose. Jefferson and Randolph 
of Virginia, the Attorney-General, took one side, Hamilton 
and Knox, Secretary of War, the other. Washington, after 
some hesitation, signed the bill, and some twenty-five years 
C. A. 10 



146 The New Nation. [Chap. 

later James Madison approved a similar bill incorporating 
the second United States Bank. Two parties, however, had 
been formed in the cabinet. From that time on, Jefferson and 
Hamilton, to use the former's words, were "pitted against each 
other every day in the cabinet, like two fighting cocks." How 
far this lack of harmony in the cabinet was known to the people 
at the moment cannot be ascertained. It soon became evident 
enough that Jefferson was out of his place in a cabinet of which 
Hamilton was the most trusted member. 

Alarmed anddisgusted at the manner in which the Federal- 
ists were setting at naught what he regarded as 
a party'leader. ^^ expressed will of the people, Jefferson began 
to organize the various sections of the opposi- 
tion into a party. His career shows him to have possessed many 
diverse qualities. He was a philosopher, and sometimes a 
visionary. He was also a politician and a political inventor of 
the most practical kind. Working in the dark, his hand was felt 
rather than seen. His lieutenants and agents bore the brunt 
of the contest, the chief, like a great commander, remaining in 
the rear — though not always out of the reach of a chance shot. 
He believed, or, at all events, he convinced others, that Hamil- 
ton and the Federalists were aiming at the establishment of a 
monarchy. He thought that Hamilton possessed at his beck 
and call "a corrupt squadron " in Congress, and that corruption 
had been used in many ways to secure the ends of the " mon- 
archists." It happened, however, that Jefferson's first blow fell 
not on Hamilton, whom he feared and disliked, but on John 
Adams, whom he liked and did not fear, regarding him, on the 
contrary, as one of the most honest and disinterested men 
alive. The Vice-President had lately published a book entitled 
Discourses on Davila — "a dull heavy work" as he himself 
afterwards called it. Jefferson, in forwarding to a printer 
for re-publication a copy of Paine 's Rights of Man, stated, 
by way of saying something pleasant, that he was glad to find that 



v.] Foreign Relations, 1793-94. 147 

something would be printed "against the political heresies 
which have recently sprung up among us." This letter was 
printed by the publisher apparently without Jefferson's consent. 
The phrase "political heresies " did much to destroy Adams's 
popularity, but after a short time the matter was settled as 
between Adams and Jefferson. The dissension in the cabinet 
now became very bitter, but Hamilton and Jefferson were not 
yet prepared for a trial of strength before the people. They 
implored Washington to be a candidate for re-election and he 
was unanimously chosen President for the second time, and 
John Adams was again elected Vice-President. 

On February ist, 1793, the French Republic declared war 
against Great Britain, and began a conflict which ^^^ Neutral- 
produced momentous consequences to theUnited ity Proclama- 
States as well as to the nations of Europe. In '°"' ^'^^''' 
America the tendencies of the time were distinctly in the direc- 
tion of democracy. The success of the new government seemed 
to justify those who had upheld extreme democratic doctrines. 
A large portion of the American people, knowing scarcely any- 
thing of the circumstances of the French Revolution, saw only 
a people striving to escape from the monarchical yoke as they 
themselves had done in the recent war, and they desired to give 
what aid they safely could to further this good work. Jefferson, 
the Secretary of State, was an ardent admirer of the French 
nation. He had left Paris in the early days of the Revolution. 
Overlooking or not comprehending the faults of the French, he 
remembered only their virtues, and sympathized with them. 
With Hamilton the case was entirely different. He had no 
sympathy at all for France, and he disliked democracy. The 
United States government was in a very difficult position. The 
Treaty of Alliance of 1778 might under some circumstances 
have given rise to much embarrassment. As it was, however, 
the indiscretions of Citizen Genet, the new Minister of the 
French Republic to the United States, strengthened fhe nands 

10 — 2 



148 The New Nation. [Chap. 

of those who advocated a policy of strict neutrality. Landing 
at Charleston, Genet at once began the fitting out of privateers, 
and seemed disposed to use the soil of the United States as if 
it were French territory. Jefferson advised him to be moderate 
in his actions; but Genet not only broke promises which he 
had made to the Secretary of State, but he defied the govern- 
ment. Washington, after mature deliberation, decided to regard 
the treaty of 1778 as not binding in this case. He, therefore, 
issued (1794) a proclamation enjoining the strictest neutrality 
as between the belligerents. This proclamation is also note- 
worthy as containing the first enunciation of what was afterwards 
known as the "Monroe doctrine," separating the affairs of the 
New World from those of Europe. Genet then appealed to the 
people against Washington. To such an issue there could be 
only one answer, and, at the request of the government, Genet 
was recalled. The passions aroused by this affair had scarcely 
begun to subside when they were excited again by the question 
of the ratification of a treaty with Great Britain which had been 
negotiated by Chief Justice John Jay. 

The Treaty of 1783 had been faithfully observed neither by 

Great Britain nor by the United States. There 
Jay's Treaty, secms to be little use at the present time in trying 

to apportion the blame. The matter had reached 
in 1793 the dangerous tu qitogu stage in which it seemed as if 
war could not be long postponed. The federal government 
was now able to compel obedience to its treaty obligations 
through the federal courts; and this being the case, Washing- 
ton sought to avoid war by sending John Jay to England. Jay 
negotiated a treaty whose sole claim to recognition is the fact 
that it deferred war between the two countries for nearly two 
decades. The treaty was regarded by a very large portion of 
the American people as most objectionable ; and it was thought 
by many that Jay had acted in the interest of a party devoted 
to England. There may have been a slight basis for this 



v.] Jay's Treaty, 1794. 149 

opinion. Undoubtedly the mercantile classes in the North and 
East were much more friendly to England than were the people 
of the South. The Federalist party was controlled by the 
Northern mercantile class. In that sense, therefore, it was a 
British party. Of Jay's personal honesty there cannot be an 
atom of doubt. His refusal to lend himself to one of Hamil- 
ton's disreputable schemes at a later day shows him to have 
been thoroughly conscientious and incorruptible. Washington, 
in conformity with the advice of two-thirds of the Senate, ratified 
the treaty, with the exception of the most offensive clause. 
But the matter did not end there. An appropriation of money 
was required to carry the treaty into effect, and the opposition, 
or Republican party, as Jefferson called it, was in control in the 
House of Representatives. The constitutional position of the 
Lower House, which alone can originate money bills, compl"- 
cated the main issue. After a brilliant debate, the House yielded 
to the outside clamour in the commercial centres of the North, 
and voted the appropriation by the small majority of forty-eight 
to forty-one. Jay's treaty, besides postponing the second war 
with Great Britain for many years, also did much to bring 
about the downfall of the Federalists. The immediate result 
was a very great diminution in Washington's popularity es- 
pecially in his own State, Virginia. 

It was at this time (1794-96) that Washington was re- 
proached in language which scarcely ever has ^^ Adam 
been exceeded. As he himself said, he was elected Presi- 
spoken of '' in such exaggerated and indecent ^"*' '''^ ' 
terms as could scarcely be applied to a Nero, to a notorious 
defaulter, or even a common pickpocket." He was now 
very sensitive to praise or to blame, and perhaps this storm of 
opprobrium may have had something to do with his determina- 
tion to retire. Jefferson ultimately seems to have used his 
influence to stop the torrent of abuse, which he easily accom- 
plished as he controlled the Republican press; and the re- 



150 The New Nation. [Chap. 

mainder of Washington's term of ofifice was passed without a 
contest of any kind. The choice of a new candidate for the 
Federalists seemed to be a difficult matter. Hamilton was 
the real leader of the party. But he was unpopular and was 
suffering from a confession of immoral conduct which had 
been forced from him to clear himself from a charge of official 
corruption. Jay would have been Hamilton's choice, but the 
great unpopularity which had gathered round Jay's treaty made 
his candidature impossible. Under these circumstances, John 
Adams was almost the only possible Federalist candidate for 
the Presidency. Instead of accepting him in good faith, 
Hamilton tried to contrive some scheme by which Pinckney, 
the Federalist candidate for second place, might be brought 
in first. Adams was popular with the rank and file of 
the Federalist party, and some of the Federalist electors, 
therefore, threw away their second votes, thereby ensuring 
the defeat of Pinckney. The Republicans showed a most 
unexpected strength. Adams was elected President by only 
three electoral votes over Jefferson who thus became Vice- 
President. 

In announcing his determination not to be again a candi- 
Washin ^^^^ ^'-'^ officc, Washington issued a Farewell 

ton's FareweU Address which had been long in preparation. 
Madison had had a share in it at the beginning, 
but more recently Hamilton had been Washington's principal 
adviser. The document was in every respect a masterly pro- 
duction, and formed a fitting close to Washington's official 
career. He advised his countrymen to foster the government 
recently established, and to preserve the public credit. With 
regard to the outside world, he wished his fellow-citizens first of 
all to be Americans, and to act with honesty toward all foreign 
countries, forming no alliances and keeping aloof from all dis- 
putes in which European countries, by their situation, were 
necessarily involved. 



v.] Relations zvitJi France, 1794-99. 151 

John Adams began his presidential career (i 797-1 801) by re- 
taining in ofifice his predecessor's chief advisers. 
Jefferson and Hamilton had long since resigned, Adams's Ad- 
and the heads of departments were men of fair "^'"istration. 
abilities only, who might easily have been replaced. This 
was a grave error as they looked to Hamilton and not to 
Adams as the leader of the Federalist party. Adams was 
thus compelled in 1798 to take most important action without 
consulting his official advisers. This he had a perfect right 
to do, as the Constitution makes the President personally 
responsible for his acts; but it precipitated a crisis fatal to 
his party. 

The main interest of Adams's administration turns on the 
relations with France, which was now under the „ , . 

Relations 

domination of the Directory. At the moment of with France, 
Adams's accession, there was a complete cessa- '^^'^'S^- 
tion of diplomatic relations between the two countries. This 
was due to the shock which the negotiation of Jay's treaty had 
given to French susceptibilities. Monroe of Virginia, a man of 
the Jeffersonian school, was then American Minister at Paris. 
Instead of trying to reconcile the French government to Jay's 
treaty, he increased the irritation which was felt in France by 
his petulant and undignified conduct, and returned to the 
United States in disgrace. Another American envoy had been 
sent away from Paris and the French Minister in the United 
States had been recalled. Adams determined to renew friendly 
relations with a power whose armies, led by Napoleon, were at 
the moment in the midst of a most brilliant campaign in Italy. 
To produce a great effect he appointed three commissioners, 
Pinckney, John Marshall, and Elbridge Gerry — the last a 
Massachusetts Republican. On their arrival at Paris, a most 
extraordinary endeavour to extort money from them was made. 
Talleyrand seems to have been at the bottom of this discredit- 
able business, but in the published despatches the letters X, Y, 



152 The New Nation. [Chap. 

and Z were used to denote the instruments of the intrigue and 
it is hence known as the "XYZ Affair." The American 
Commissioners resisted in a most dignified way, and the 
outspoken reply of Pinckney to one of the French agents: 
"Millions for defence; not one cent for tribute" became 
a rallying cry for the Federalists. The Republicans saw 
with dismay the ground cut from beneath their feet by the 
action of their French friends. Had the Federalists been 
united and well led, they might have grasped the great oppor- 
tunity presented by this crisis to win the goodwill and support 
of their countrymen. As it was, Washington used his influence 
to place Hamilton in a position of practical superiority in 
military matters as regarded Adams. Such a position was 
untenable, as the President under the Constitution was the 
head of the army. To free himself from this thraldom Adams 
seized the first opportunity to make peace with France and to 
rid himself of Hamilton and Hamilton's creatures. 

The measures adopted by Congress, practically at the dicta- 
tion of the Federalists, were admirable so far as 
f ofwar^*'""^ ^^ defence of the country was concerned. A new 
army organization was set on foot with Washing- 
ton in nominal command, but with Hamilton the real com- 
mander, at least until the campaign should actually begin. The 
navy, which already had been begun during some recent dis- 
putes with Algiers, was now organized, and rendered good ser- 
vice — one of the frigates, the Constellation, capturing the 
French frigate riiisurgente. 

The Federalists committed a fatal blunder, however, in the 
, .,. passage of the Alien and Sedition Acts. These 

The Alien ^ ° 

and Sedition laws Seem to have been modelled on similar laws 
^"^'®' enacted by the British Parliament at about the 

same time. The Alien Acts authorized the President, at his 
discretion, to cause aliens to be removed from the country; or 
to permit them to reside at certain places specified by him, 



v.] The Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions. 153 

on their giving bonds for good behaviour. The Sedition 
Act provided severe penalties for those who should resist the 
lawful acts of the federal officials, and for all who might be 
concerned in any publication bringing or tending to bring the 
United States government or any of its officers into disrepute. 
At nearly the same time, the period of residence required 
for naturalization was lengthened from five to fourteen years. 
Led by Albert Gallatin, a recent immigrant from Switzerland, 
the Republicans in Congress strenuously opposed these acts. 
But they were overborne, and the laws were passed. Defeated 
in Congress, the Republicans then had recourse to expedients 
familiar enough in pre-revolutionary days. The legislatures 
of Kentucky and Virginia passed Resolutions (1798-99) which 
were transmitted to the legislatures of the other States for their 
action thereon. The Kentucky Resolutions were introduced 
into the legislature of that State by Mr Breckenridge. The real 
author, however, was Jefferson, and it is he who must be held 
responsible for the constitutional theories propounded in these 
resolutions. These theories were briefly (i) that the Consti- 
tution was a compact between the States; (2) that the co-States 
were the judges of the validity of federal laws; and (3) not the 
federal government which was their agent. In the original draft, 
as written by Jefferson, the reasoning was carried to its logical 
conclusion, namely, that the States might "nullify " those acts 
of the Federal Congress which were outside the strict limits of 
the powers delegated to that body. This dogma of nullification 
was too bold for the Kentucky legislators in 1798; but in the 
resolutions passed the next year it was set forth at length. The 
Virginia Resolutions were drafted by Madison, who was now 
firmly attached to the Republican party. They were much 
milder in tone, as befitted the work of the more cautious 
Madison. Nothing came of either of these attempts to secure 
concerted action on the part of the States against the federal 
government. 



154 T^^^^ New Nation. [Chap. 

A letter which Hamilton wrote to Mr Dayton, Speaker of 
the House of Representatives, contains the ex- 
Hamiiton's tremc Federalist view, and may be regarded in 
some measure as an answer to the Kentucky and 
Virginia Resolutions. In this letter, Hamilton advocated the 
cutting up of the States into small divisions for the purposes 
of increasing the number and power of the federal courts. 
He also thought that an amendment to the Constitution was 
desirable, authorizing Congress at its discretion to divide the 
larger States into two or more States. He advised the retention 
of the army on its present war footing, even if peace should be 
made with France. At this moment Adams, without any con- 
sultation with the members of his cabinet or with the party 
leaders, reopened negotiations with France, and thus put an 
abrupt ending to the dreams of Hamilton and his friends. 
It appears that the publication of the X Y Z correspondence 
caused great excitement among the governing 
with France circlcs in France. Talleyrand saw that he had 
renewe . gone too far and tried to draw back. An intima- 

tion was conveyed to Vans Murray, the American Minister at 
the Hague, that if the United States would send an envoy 
to Paris, he would be well received. Adams grasped at the 
chance offered him to bring peace to his country. He nomi- 
nated Vans Murray as Minister to France. But the party 
leaders in the Senate, amazed and furious at this sudden 
change of front, seemed determined to reject the nomination. 
The President then substituted a commission, consisting of 
Ellsworth, Jay's successor as Chief Justice, Patrick Henry, and 
Vans Murray, and these nominations were confirmed. Patrick 
Henry, now old and infirm, declined to go, and Davie, of 
North Carolina, another Southern Federalist, was appointed in 
his stead. Adams also seized the first opportunity to remove 
his most treacherous advisers, substituting John Marshall, of ■ 
Virginia, for Timothy Pickering as Secretary of State. 



v.] The Election of 1800. 155 

The Commissioners were well treated in France. Napoleon 
was now First Consul, He appointed a com- 
mission, presided over by Joseph Bonaparte, to pranTefiS^o. 
negotiate with them, but he refused to pay for 
American property seized by the French government or by its 
agents during the recent troubles or to consent to the formal 
abandonment of the Treaty of Alliance of 1778. These 
subjects were to be reserved for future negotiations. The 
United States Senate refused to ratify the clause embodying 
this arrangement. In other respects the treaty was satisfactory 
to both parties, and it was ultimately agreed that the United 
States should give up its contention as to the payment of claims, 
and the French government consented to regard the Treaty of 
1778 as no longer binding. Thus by the act of the Federalist 
Senate, the United States became liable to its own citizens for 
French spoliations committed before 1800. It is only within 
the last few years, when legal proof has become almost impos- 
sible, that the American government has consented to pay 
these "French spoliation claims." 

In 1800, for the first time, a presidential election was con- 
tested with great vigour and acrimony. The 
Federalist party laboured under many serious ^^ jg^^^ 
disadvantages. Adams's administration had 
been most fortunate for the country, and time has vindicated the 
purity of his motives and the wisdom of his actions. He was 
still popular with the mass of the party and he became the 
Federalist candidate. There was no one else to be nominated 
with any prospect of success. Hamilton would have been an 
impossible candidate; Jay refused to enter national politics 
again; and Washington and Henry were both dead. Accepting 
Adams as the inevitable leader, Hamilton embarked on a course 
of petty intrigue similar to those intrigues of 1788 and 1796 
already described. The candidate for Vice-President was 
Charles C. Pinckney of South Carolina. It was now proposed 



156 The New Nation. [Chap. 

that the South Carolina electors should vote for Jefferson and 
Pinckney, in the expectation that the additional votes thus 
given to Pinckney would elect him President, and return 
Adams to the Vice-Presidency. Pinckney honourably declined 
to be a party to the transaction. To discredit Adams with 
his own party, Hamilton wrote a long dissertation to prove 
Adams's unfitness for the highest office. It was intended 
that this document should be passed from hand to hand among 
the leaders of the party. But the Republicans secured a 
copy and published it far and wide. The Federalists would 
probably have been defeated in any event, as the Alien and 
Sedition Laws had aroused so much opposition that they 
dreaded to have their own instrument put into force. Every 
prosecution under these laws converted thousands of voters 
to the Republican party. Jefferson had now perfected the 
organization of that party, and while the Federalists were 
quarrelling among themselves, the Republicans were united 
and able to take advantage of every opportunity that presented 
itself. The Republican candidate forVice-Presidentwas Aaron 
Burr, a disreputable New York politician — one of the first and 
ablest of his kind. He had formed the New York Republicans 
into a compact well-drilled political organization, and had thus 
won his nomination. When the electoral votes were counted 
it was found that Jefferson and Burr had each received seventy- 
three votes, while Adams had sixty-five and Pinckney sixty-four 
votes. It was clear that Adams and Pinckney were defeated. 
But who was chosen President, Jefferson or Burr? 

The Constitution provided that in case of a tie of this 
description the House of Representatives, voting 
Amendment, by States, should elect as President one of the 
^^°'*' two having the highest number. The Federalists 

were in a majority in the House both as ordinarily constituted 
and also when organized on the basis of each State having one 
vote. There was not the slightest doubt in anyone's mind as 



v.] The yudiciary Act, \Zo\. 157 

to which candidate the people had intended to elect President. 
Jefferson was the foremost man in the country, the creator of 
the Republican party, and loved and respected by nine-tenths 
of the voters of that party. Burr, on the other hand, was a 
mere politician who had been placed on the ticket to secure 
the vote of New York. The Federalists, blinded by their 
hatred of Jefferson, determined to elect Burr President. This 
was against Hamilton's wish, who disliked Burr on his own 
account. Thirty-five ballots were cast before the Federalists 
could bring themselves to carry out the clearly-expressed will of 
the people. Ultimately Jefferson was declared elected President 
and Burr Vice-President. To avoid the many inconveniences 
which were inseparable from the existing mode of electing 
President and Vice-President, an amendment to the Constitu- 
tion (the Twelfth Amendment) was adopted in 1804. The old 
machinery of electors was preserved, but each elector in the 
future was to vote for President and for Vice-President on 
separate and distinct ballots. In case no candidate for Presi- 
dent should receive a majority of all the votes cast, it was 
provided that the House of Representatives, voting by States, 
should elect one of the three having the highest number of 
votes President. In a similar case as to the Vice-President the 
Senate should elect one of the two having the highest number 
Vice-President. The only valuable feature of the old system 
was that able men were nominated for both offices, as it was 
very uncertain how any election would turn out. Since 1804, 
however, second-rate and even third-rate men have been chosen 
to the second place. 

Defeated at the polls, the Federalists retreated " into the 
Judiciary as a stronghold." After the results of 
the elections were known they passed a law ^^''V"'^'"*'^^ 
largely increasing the national judicial estab- 
lishment, although the existing organization was more than 
sufficient to transact all the judicial business of the country. 



158 The Nezu Nation. [Chap. 

In this way many new offices were created and more than 
twenty-three new appointments — presumably for life — placed 
in Adams's hands. He promoted many of the district judges 
to these new places, and was thereby enabled to appoint to the 
old places thus vacated many Federalist members of Congress 
who were constitutionally ineligible to the new offices — as a 
member of Congress cannot be appointed to any office created 
by an Act passed while he is in Congress. One of the last 
appointments of Adams deserves to be noted. Ellsworth 
resigned the Chief Justiceship on account of his advanced age; 
and Adams nominated to the vacant post John Marshall of 
Virginia, at the moment acting as Secretary of State. For 
thirty-five years he remained at the head of the Supreme 
Court, imposing his ideas on the new Associate Justices, as 
one after another they appeared. During these years John 
Marshall laid down the broad construction theory of the Con- 
stitution first propounded by Hamilton. In truth, however, 
Jefferson once in power forgot many of his former theories, and 
exercised whatever authority he wished, with slight regard to 
the Constitution, as for instance in the case of the Louisiana 
Purchase. 

Adams's departure from political life was a most unfitting 
„^ ,,„.j close to a great career. According to a tradi- 

The " Mid- ° ° 

night appoint- tion, preserved in Jefferson's family, at midnight 
'"^"*®' on March 3rd, 1801, Levi Lincoln, of Massa- 

chusetts, Jefferson's proposed Attorney-General, with the new 
President's watch in his hand, entered the office of the Secretary 
of State and ordered Marshall to stop countersigning commis- 
sions. At daybreak the next morning, Adams began his last 
journey from the seat of government to his home at Quincy, 
Massachusetts, without waiting to see his successful rival in- 
augurated into office. Looking backward, it seems clear that 
Adams's failure in his party was due to the fact that he was in 
the wrong party. He seems to have become conscious of this 



v.] TJie End of Adams s Career. 159 

later on. During their last years Adams and Jefferson became 
friends once more. On July 4th, 1826, on the fiftieth anni- 
versary of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence, 
these two men, the one the author, the other the defender 
of that great declaration, died. The last words that fell from 
Adams's lips were "Thomas Jefferson still lives." 



CHAPTER VI. 

SUPREMACY OF THE JEFFERSONIAN REPUBLICANS. 
180I-I809. 

The first administration of Thomas Jefferson (1801-1805) 
marked the close of a revolution as important 
ideaTs"i8oo. ^^^ ^^ far-reaching in its consequences to the 

American people as the movement of 1776-83, 
which one ordinarily associates with the phrase " the American 
Revolution." A better usage would include both movements 
in this term. In 1776, the colonists freed themselves from the 
bonds which had hitherto bound together the several groups 
that used the English tongue. In 1800, the American people 
broke away from its own past and entered upon the work of 
the Nineteenth Century with that spirit of modern liberalism 
which one might well call the Nineteenth Century spirit. In 
this, they stood almost alone. Nowhere else were the ideas 
which have made this century memorable in the history of 
the human race so well developed and so openly recognized. 
It is true that the French at one time had seemed about to 
take the lead in the march of progress. But France was now 
under the rule of a military despot. In America, on the other 
hand, the ardour of the earlier revolution, chastened and 
confined within more reasonable limits, again asserted itself. 
The Federalist party was conservative — ultra-conservative. It 
clung hopelessly and despondently to the eighteenth century 

160 



Chap, vi.] TJie American People in i8oo. l6l 

ideas of law and order in society and government. It was 
defeated in 1800, not because it was Federalist, but because it 
held to the ideals of a bygone age. The American voters, 
strong in their faith in humanity and in human progress, 
would no longer consent to place the government of a free 
people in the hands of those who believed in government by a 
minority. It will be well to stop a moment and observe the con- 
dition of the American people at the beginning of the century. 
The area of the United States was then about 849,145 
square miles, the same as in 178^. The total ^ ■ ■ 

^ . Statistics of 

population was given in the census of 1800 Population, 
at five million three hundred thousand. This ^^°°' 
may be compared with four millions in 1790 and one million 
six hundred thousand in 1760. The American people was still 
mainly engaged in agriculture. This can be easily understood 
from a slight analysis of the population. If we take the line of 
five thousand as determining whether the inhabitants of a town 
should be classed as a rural or urban population, we find that 
in 1800 there were only eleven towns containing five thousand 
inhabitants or over.^ Five of these towns, Philadelphia, New 
York, Baltimore, Boston, and Charleston, each contained over 
twenty thousand inhabitants. The total urban population was 



1 The population of these eleven towns is thus recorded in the Second 
Census : 

Philadelphia, Pa 70,287 

New York, N.Y 60,489 

Baltimore, Md 26,614 

Boston, Mass 24,027 

Charleston, S.C 20,473 

Providence, R.I 7,614 

Savannah, Ga 7,523 

Norfolk, Va 6,926 

Richmond, Va 5,537 

Albany, N.Y 5,349 

Portsmouth, N.H 5i339 

C. A. II 



1 62 The yeffersonian RepiLblicans. [Chap. 

two hundred and forty thousand or about five per cent, of the 
whole. 

The population of the United States was distributed by 

sections somewhat as follows : New England 
the popuiaUon. Contained, in round numbers, one million two 

hundred thousand, the Middle States one million 
four hundred thousand, and the Southern States two million 
two hundred thousand. The population of the States north 
of Mason and Dixon's line was nearly two million seven 
hundred thousand, or, excluding slaves, one hundred thousand 
less. Subtracting the slave population from the total popula- 
tion of the Southern States, we find that the white population of 
that section was one million three hundred thousand, or only 
just half that of the North. A study of these figures in detail 
will show more clearly the great differences already existing 
between the two sections. The South, with a total popula- 
tion of over two millions, contained only two large towns, 
Baltimore and Charleston, and a total urban population of 
sixty-seven thousand. The North, with a total population of 
over two millions and a half, contained two cities of over sixty 
thousand inhabitants each, and a total urban population of over 
one hundred and seventy thousand. One or two comparisons 
will be of interest as showing the extent to which slavery was 
even then exercising its influence. Taking Pennsylvania and 
Virginia, we find that Pennsylvania with a population of about 
six hundred thousand possessed a city of seventy thousand 
inhabitants. On the other hand, Virginia, whose boundaries 
for a long distance marched with those of Pennsylvania, con- 
tained no town of over seven thousand, and had an urban 
population of only twelve thousand four hundred and three 
in a total population of nearly nine hundred thousand. In 
Pennsylvania there were no slaves, in Virginia there were three 
hundred and fifty thousand slaves. This contrast between two 
States lying almost side by side is most interesting and forms 



VI.] TJie American People in 1800. 163 

one of the best examples of the play of State lines, as well as of 
the results which slavery had already produced in the social 
development of the South. Slavery was practically extinct in 
the North, every State, except New Jersey, having since 1780 
abolished slavery or set on foot some scheme for gradual 
emancipation which, as a matter of fact, ended in abolition. 
In the South, many far-seeing men, like Washington and 
Jefferson, were anxious to have the slaves in that quarter 
emancipated. But this was impossible, as the slaves formed 
such a large portion of the invested capital of the country. It 
could have been brought about only through purchase, in 
one form or another, by the national government. The 
funds for this purpose must have been largely, if not entirely, 
drawn from the North, and the people of that section having 
freed their own slaves without assistance would probably have 
been very unwilling to contribute to the aid of the South. 
This seems to have been the only moment when the slave- 
owners might have been bought out on reasonable terms and 
without bloodshed, and no such plan was even mentioned. 
The recent invention of the cotton gin combined with important 
inventions in the machinery for cotton spinning and weaving 
gave a tremendous stimulus to the production of cotton. After 
the cultivation of that staple on a large scale had become 
common in the South, slavery could be abolished only by war. 
The American people still clung to the Atlantic seaboard, 
with the exception of two or three communities 

, . , , T . r .1 • Communica- 

which had sprung up west of the mountains, tion with the 
The conditions of transportation had made Mississippi 
scarcely any progress since 1760. Four roads 
or paths led from the seaboard over the mountains — two of 
them leading to the northern portion and two to the southern 
portion of the Ohio valley. About four hundred thousand 
settlers — including slaves — inhabited these vast solitudes be- 
tween the mountains and the Mississippi. Separated by a 

II — 2 



164 TJie Jeffersonian Republicans. [Chap. 

wilderness from the older States, the new settlements were 
a constant menace to the Union. The isolation of these 
western hamlets is comparable only to that of the inhabitants 
of some of the remote river valleys of Europe in the mediaeval 
time. Jefferson regarded the rapid colonization of the western 
lands with alarm. No one could have foreseen at that time 
(1800) the changes which the introduction of the steam loco- 
motive and the steamboat would make in the political aspects 
of the new world. It is almost safe to say that the political 
results which have flowed from the introduction of steam have 
equalled in importance for America the economic results. 
Without easy communication of some kind in the years 1800- 
1860 the area now occupied by the United States, if settled 
at all, must have been possessed by several different political 
organizations having varied and divergent interests. 

In the art of living, the people in 1800 were where their 

fathers had been forty years before. In letters 
tion"^i8oo°"'^'" ^^^ learning there had been a slight advance, 

and the beginnings of a new era might even then 
be discerned. The religious oligarchy still maintained its hold 
on the New England intellect, but its days were numbered. 
The colleges seemed to be at a standstill — there were fewer 
students at Harvard in 1800 than in 1700. Philadelphia was 
still the literary and intellectual centre of the country, but even 
there during these years there seems to have been retro- 
gression rather than advance. The American people was ab- 
sorbed in repairing the havoc and waste of years of war and 
anarchy. This attempt had been successful, as an examination 
of the census returns will show. 

The year 1792 is the first year for which we have trustworthy 

returns. Let us compare a few of the statistics 
growth, 1792- for that year with those of 1800. The total ex- 
^ °°' ports were valued in 1792 at twenty millions of 

dollars, in 1800 at seventy millions. In 1792 the imports were 
valuedatthirty-onemillionsagainst ninety-one millions in 1800. 



VI.] yefferson s First Inangiiration, 1801. 165 

The income of the government had risen in this time from three 
million six hmidred thousand dollars to ten million six hundred 
thousand. The federal expenditure, exclusive of interest on 
the national debt, had increased from one million eight hundred 
thousand to over seven millions. These figures show at once 
the increase in prosperity which followed the adoption of the 
Constitution, and also the success which had attended Hamil- 
ton's efforts to build up a large governmental establishment and 
to draw to it the revenues of the country. The very magnitude 
of the federal receipts and payments alarmed Jefferson. 

The country did not have long to wait before it became 
conscious that with Jefferson a new order was to , „ 

•' Jefferson s 

be introduced into the government. Instead of inaugural Ad- 
proceeding in coach and four to the inaugura- '^^^^' ^ °'' 
tion ceremonies, as had been customary, Jefferson walked 
to the capitol, read his inaugural address and took the oath 
of office. A few sentences from this address will serve to 
show that Jefferson, in becoming President, did not intend 
to abandon the theories of a lifetime. "The sum of good 
government," to his mind, was "a wise and frugal government, 
which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which 
shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of 
industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth 
of labour the bread it has earned." As to his late opponents, 
he desired conciliation, saying, " We are all Republicans, Ave are 
all Federalists." By this he meant, no doubt, that the mass of 
the Federalist party was composed of honest men who would 
be Republicans if they were well informed. He then laid down 
the broad lines of his policy, as follows: "Equal and exact 
justice to all men, of whatever state or persuasion, religious 
or political; peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all 
nations, entangling alliances with none; . . . economy in 
the public expenditure, that labour may be lightly burdened; 
the honest payment of our debts, and sacred preservation 



1 66 The Jejfersonian Republicans. [Chap. 

of the public faith; encouragement of agriculture, and of 
commerce as its handmaid; the diffusion of information, and 
arraignment of all abuses at the bar of public reason; free- 
dom of religion, freedom of the press, and freedom of the 
person. . . . Should we wander from them [the above 
principles] in moments of error or alarm, let us hasten to 
retrace our steps and regain the road which alone leads to 
peace, liberty, and safety." Anticipating our narrative, for a 
moment, it may be said that Jefferson so managed matters that 
in four years' time the Federalist electoral vote fell froni sixty- 
five to fourteen. 

The new President was very fortunate in the selection of 
his leading advisers. He placed Madison at the 

Changes in ° ^ 

the Civil Ser- head of the State department and Gallatin at the 
head of the Treasury. Two Massachusetts men, 
Dearborn and Lincoln, were Secretary of War and Attorney- 
General, respectively. The first three of these four men re- 
mained Jefferson's chief advisers during the eightyearsof his ad- 
ministration. The Republican President found the government 
offices occupied by Federalists. Among these office-holders 
were some of the most bitter opponents of the administration. 
One of these was Goodrich, formerly a Representative from 
Connecticut, who had resigned his seat to accept from President 
Adams the CoUectorship of Revenue at New Haven. Nowhere 
was Federalism more rampant than in Connecticut. President 
Dwight of Yale College, situated at New Haven, probably ex- 
pressed the opinions of many leading Federalists in the follow- 
ing remarkable sentences written soon after the inaugura- 
tion : " We have now reached the consummation of democratic 
blessedness. We have a country governed by blockheads and 
knaves; the ties of marriage with all its felicities are severed 
and destroyed. . . . Can the imagination paint anything 
more dreadful on this side hell ? " It chanced that a young man 
named Bishop, at about this time, delivered an address defending 



VI.] The Civil Service. 167 

Republicanism before the literary societies of the college over 
which Mr. Dwight presided. Jefferson removed Goodrich from 
the collectorship and appointed the father of this young orator to 
the place. The matter attracted attention out of all comparison 
with its importance. It must be conceded that Jefferson believed 
that a party containing more than one-half of the voters of the 
country was entitled to a participation in the offices maintained 
by the nation. But in the first fourteen months of his administra- 
tion, he removed only sixteen office-holders without assigning 
adequate reasons. To one office-seeker, who asserted that the 
Republicans were entitled to the offices as saviours of the coun- 
try, he is said to have answered that " Rome was once saved by 
geese; but I have never heard these geese were made revenue 
officers." So far from using the government offices to reward 
his followers, Jefferson cut down the civil service, and thus to a 
considerable extent deprived himself of the means of so doing. 
As to Adams's "midnight appointments" he felt free to com- 
plete them or not as he chose, and he even refused to deliver 
commissions which Adams and Marshall had left properly 
signed at the moment of their hasty exit from office. The new 
federal courts were abolished by Act of Congress, and no one 
seriously questioned the constitutionality of the act. The 
judges of the Supreme and District courts of the United States 
held their offices for life. They were all Federalists, and so, 
too, were the minor officials of these courts. Jefferson felt that 
it was unwise to leave a great and important department wholly 
in the control of a party which the people had repudiated. He 
removed as many of the inferior officials as possible, substi- 
tuting Republicans in their places. An attempt was also made 
to secure a place on the bench of the Supreme Court through 
the impeachment of Samuel Chase, one of the Associate Jus- 
tices; but it failed owing, in some measure, to the mis- 
management of the impeachers. The cautious temperaments 
of Jefferson and Marshall prevented any further conflicts, and 



1 68 The yeffersonian Republicans. [Chap. 

the Supreme Court remained in the control of the Federalists 
for many years. The necessity for the removals, above noted, 
is to be deplored, as they furnished a precedent for the whole- 
sale removals of Jackson's time. But, as some writers have 
pointed out, Jefferson's action was made necessary by the earlier 
proscription of the Republicans by the Federalists. 

The National Debt had increased in nine years (1792-1801) 
from seventy-seven to eighty-two million dollars, 

Gallatin's -' ° -' ,• i i i 

financial although this increase was not realized by the 

P"^**^^" people, owing to the operation of a sinking fund. 

Of the income of the government, some ten millions in all, only 
about one and one-half million was derived from the internal 
taxes, which were collected at great disproportionate expense, 
and were very irritating to large sections of the population. The 
total expenditure of the government was nearly seven and one- 
half millions. Of this sum almost three and one-half millions 
were devoted to the navy. Jefferson and Gallatin were anxious 
to reduce these charges and taxes in the interests of economy, 
and also to undo as much as possible of the centralization of the 
Federalist government. Itwas plain that the great increase of ex- 
penditure had been on the navy. Jefferson disliked a naval estab- 
lishment in itself. He believed that wars and disputes were of ten 
occasioned by the action of naval officers, or perhaps grew out 
of the presence of naval vessels in foreign ports. He also thought 
that the possession of naval renown made for war. If Jefferson 
had had his way he would have tied the war-ships to the most 
convenient wharves, employing a few watchmen to guard them. 
This would have freed at least three millions each year for the 
reduction of the debt, and the loss of the internal revenue 
taxes was to be made good by reduction in the diplomatic 
service and in the judiciary. It proved to be impossible to 
carry out this scheme in its entirety. The internal taxes were 
abolished and with them a large number of offices. But 
although the national debt was in part extinguished, the 



VI-] yefferson s First Administration, 1 80 1-5. 169 

creation of a new debt to pay for the purchase of land in 1803 
and for the War of 181 2 postponed the extinction of the debt 
for many years, although Gallatin reduced it from eighty-two 
million to about forty million dollars. As to the navy, its first 
renown was gained during Jefferson's administration. 

The Barbary Corsairs seem to have had little faith in theories 
as to the possibilities or virtues of ageneral peace. 
They had demanded and received money from ^^^ war"^° '' 
the United States, and at last in 1800, as a means 
of extracting a larger tribute, the Pacha of Tripoli declared 
war against the United States. Jefferson, instead of tying the 
vessels to a wharf, was obliged to send them to the Mediter- 
ranean. One expedition necessitated another, and in 1803 
the Republican Administration began the construction of 
several sloops-of-war especially designed for service on the 
coasts of Northern Africa. In 1804, the matter was concluded 
to the satisfaction of the United States. It was during this 
war that the American naval officers gained the skill which 
stood them in good stead in the later contest with Great 
Britain. The people listened with avidity to the recitals of 
the deeds of daring associated with the names of Decatur, 
Preble, Bainbridge, and Barron, and acquired a taste for naval 
adventure, quite foreign to the desires of the President. 

The most important act of this administration was the 
purchase of that territory lying between the 
Mississippi, the Rocky Mountains, and the Rio gains Louisi- 
Grande, which then was known under the general ^"^' ' °°' 
name of Louisiana. The colony included under this designa- 
tion had been settled originally by the French at the end of 
the seventeenth and the beginning of the eighteenth century. 
It had led a struggling and feeble existence, and in 1763 it 
was ceded to Spain to recompense her for Florida, which that 
power had been obliged to give to Great Britain in exchange 
f or Havanna — captured by the British in 176 1. It is important 



170 The yeffersonian Republicans. [Chap. 

to observe at the outset that this vast region had been valued 
in 1763 as the equivalent of the Spanish colony of Florida. 
The French King, at the time that he ceded Louisiana to 
Spain, had ceded his other territories on the continent of 
North America to Great Britain. In 1797, France had once 
more become the most powerful military state in Europe. 
Talleyrand, at that time foreign minister, conceived the scheme 
of rebuilding her former colonial empire, in the hope, per- 
haps, of forcing her people upon the sea, and in this way re- 
establishing her marine. He designed, as the iirst part of this 
plan, to regain Louisiana from Spain. Napoleon, when he 
became the first power in France, entered heartily into Talley- 
rand's plans, and forced Spain (1800) to retrocede Louisiana 
to France. The price paid for this cession was the dangerous 
goodwill of Napoleon and an elusive Italian throne for the 
Spanish king's son-in-law. 

The announcement of this change of ownership aroused a 
^^ . , storm of indignation in the United States. The 

The Ad- ° 

ministration pacific Jeff crsou, forgetting the interests of peace, 
aroused. wrote a letter, the gist of which was to be com- 

municated to the French government. A few sentences from 
this letter will serve to show how serious the matter seemed to 
the President. Among other things, he said: "The day that 
France takes possession of New Orleans fixes the sentence 
which is to restrain her for ever within her low-water mark. 
It seals the union of two nations, who, in conjunction, can 
maintain exclusive possession of the ocean. From that moment 
we must marry the British fleet and nation." 

The matter was further complicated by the action of the 
^^ , . . Spanish authorities at New Orleans. The Mis- 

The Louisi- ^ 

ana Purchase, sissippi formed the principal outlet for the people 
' °^" of the western portions of the United States. The 

lumber, grain, and other produce of the Ohio basin was carried on 
flatboats or rafts to New Orleans and there placed on sea-going 



VI.] The Louisiana Purchase, 1803. 171 

vessels. The United States had secured from Spain the right 
for her citizens to store their goods at New Orleans pending 
trans-shipment. There was no topic about which the people 
of Kentucky and Tennessee were so sensitive as the navigation 
of the Mississippi. Suddenly, the Spanish Intendant at New 
Orleans withdrew "the right of deposit" from the Americans. 
The indignation of the westerners blazed out in fury. Jefferson 
was forced to do something besides write letters. Orders were 
at once sent to Livingston, the American Minister at Paris, to 
buy the strip of coast extending eastward from the Mississippi 
and including New Orleans, and Congress voted money to pay 
for it. For a time Livingston pressed the matter upon the at- 
tention of the French government with great pertinacity but 
without success. But on April nth, 1803, Talleyrand startled 
him by inquiring "whether the United States wished to have 
the whole of Louisiana? " Two days later Monroe of Virginia, 
who had been sent abroad with a species of roving commission, 
reached Paris; but the actual conduct of the negotiation re- 
mained in Livingston's hands. Eventually the Americans, ex- 
ceeding their instructions, bought Louisiana for the sum of 
fifteen million dollars, of which three and three-quarter millions 
were to be used to pay claims of Americans for spoliations 
committed by France since 1800. The precise motive which 
actuated Napoleon in making this sale seems impossible to 
discover. The reason usually assigned by writers is that 
foreseeing war with England he could not hope to retain 
Louisiana and preferred that it should fall to the United 
States rather than to England. This however does not 
seem to be an adequate explanation, as the fate of Louisiana 
at the close of a war would depend mainly upon Napoleon's 
success or failure in Europe. It would be interesting to 
ascertain Jefferson's feelings at the moment the report of 
the purchase reached him. For years he had been pro- 
claiming that the federal government possessed such powers 



172 The ycjfersoiiian Republicans. [Chap. 

only as were expressly delegated to it by the Constitution. 
But there was nothing in the Constitution authorizing the 
United States to buy land. In^ the first moment of surprise, 
he declared that an amendment to the Constitution would be 
necessary. But the impolicy of thus delaying the ratification 
of the treaty was evident. He laid aside his scruples for the 
moment and nothing was ever done in the matter. Yet the 
purchase of Louisiana with all its possibilities was an act far 
exceeding in doubtfulness anything the Federalists had ever 
done. The limits of the new acquisition were even more 
dubious. The treaty described the territory ceded as "the 
colony or province of Louisiana, with the same extent as it 
now has in the hands of Spain, and that it had when France 
possessed it, and such as it should be after the treaties subse- 
quently entered into between Spain and other powers." The 
United States government immediately asserted that it included 
West Florida, but did not press its claim to Texas, or the country 
between the settlements in the Mississippi basin and the Rio 
Grande. Mr Henry Adams has recently discovered the orders 
issued by the French government, when it expected to take 
possession of the country for itself. This document shows 
that France and Spain understood the cession to include 
Texas and to exclude any part of West Florida. Li view of 
these facts, it is difficult to describe the boundaries of Louisiana 
or to state its area. It may be said, however, to have included 
the whole western half of the Mississippi valley, the Island 
of New Orleans, and the country between the Mississippi and 
the Rio Grande. It also may be regarded as having given the 
people of the United States the opportunity of acquiring Oregon 
by rendering the colonization of that region more easy. 

The general satisfaction felt by the people at the peaceful 
, „ acquisition of this domain and the settlement 

Jefferson re- ^ 

elected Pres- of all disputes as to the navigation of the Missis- 
1 ent, I 04. sippi increased if possible Jefferson's popularity. 



VI-] Jefferson's Second Term, 1 805-9. ^73 

He was re-elected President in 1804 by one hundred and 
sixty-two votes against fourteen cast for Pinckney, the 
Federalist candidate. Even New Hampshire and Massa- 
chusetts gave their votes to Jefferson. Connecticut and 
Delaware were the only States whose entire vote was given 
to the Federalists. 

Two things attract the student's attention during Jefferson's 
second administration: Burr's conspiracy, and „ 

^ -' ' Burr s con- 

the complicated relations with Great Britain and spiracy and 
France. Aaron Burr, the late Vice-President, 
was now thoroughly discredited politically by his double- 
dealing with both parties. Socially he was an outcast, for the 
killing of Hamilton in a duel had aroused the moral feelings of 
the people in the North and may be said to have put an end 
to duelling in that part of the country. He was in debt and 
without any means of support, as he could not resume his law 
practice in New York. He turned his uneasy eyes to the 
South-west and there saw a field of operations commensurate 
with his desires and his abilities. What Burr really had in 
mind has never been ascertained. At times he spoke of 
becoming an Emperor with descent to his daughter Theodosia. 
At another time, the scheme seems to have been to separate 
the country west of the mountains from the older States on the 
Atlantic seaboard, and to found a new republic in the wilder- 
ness, with Burr, perhaps, as President. It is not unlikely that 
the real design of the plotters was never disclosed. At all 
events, the conspiracy ended in complete failure. Wilkinson, 
the American commander in Louisiana, at the last moment 
determined to be true to his country and false to his friend. 
Burr, finding his scheme hopeless, abandoned his comrades and 
tried to reach Florida through the sparsely settled country 
between the Mississippi and the peninsula of Florida. He was 
recognized in a frontier town and taken to Richmond for trial. 
The end was as ludicrous as any part of the scheme, for Chief 



174 The yejfersonian Republicans. [Chap. 

Justice John Marshall, who presided at the trial, ruled that an 
overt act of treason within the meaning of the Constitution 
must be first proved and then Burr connected with it. As Burr 
had never been able to levy war the prosecution for treason 
stopped at that point. Other prosecutions for misdemeanour 
shared a similar fate, and many years later Burr died quietly in 
New York at the advanced age of eighty years. 

The renewal of the European contest brought in its train 
_ ., newvexations and hardships to the United States, 

Commercial '^ ' 

relations, 1783- and the War of 1812 was largely the result of the 
' °^' ill-feeling thus aroused. It will be well to go 

back a few years and to consider as one subject the commercial 
relations of the United States with foreign powers before 1812. 
%-The Americans seem to have expected to enjoy as an inde- 
pendent nation the same rights of trade which they had enjoyed 
as members of the British Empire. In this they were dis- 
appointed. The traffic which they especially desired was that 
with the English West India Islands. As those islands did not 
produce sufficient food for their own inhabitants the British 
government permitted a few commodities to be imported from 
the United States in British bottoms, provided payment were 
made in molasses or rum — payment in sugar being forbidden. 
The Americans moreover carried on a large and profitable 
trade with the French and Spanish West Indies — whose direct 
intercourse with the mother lands was now difficult, owing 
to the vigilance of the British cruisers. Landing these French 
and Spanish colonial goods on an American wharf and 
paying duty, the Americans would then place them again 
on shipboard — perhaps on the same vessel from which they 
had been unloaded — receive the greater part of the duty 
back in the shape of a "drawback," and sail away for a 
French or Spanish port. One of these vessels, the Polly, 
was seized and carried to Great Britain. Sir William Scott, 
better known perhaps by his later title of Lord Stowell, decided 



VI.] Commercial Relations, 1 783-1 804. 175 

as Judge in the British Admiralty Court that voyages made 
under the above circumstances had been broken, and that the 
Polly and her cargo must be regarded as American. There 
was also in existence in those days an agreement between 
certain nations of Europe known as "The Rule of War of 
1756." This was to the effect that no nation could enjoy in 
time of war a trade denied to it in time of peace. Under the 
operation of this rule, the Americans had no right to enter or 
leave French or Spanish West India ports. In the winter of 
1793-94, the British West India cruisers seized many of the 
American vessels in the West Indies. President Washington 
protested, and by Jay's Treaty this matter was settled practically 
in favour of the Americans, though direct trade between the 
French Islands and France in American bottoms was prohibited. 
Under these favourable circumstances, American commerce 
flourished beyond measure. This was the condition of affairs 
when the Peace of Amiens (1802) put a period to the first part of 
the great war. Great Britain entered on the second part of that 
struggle in a stern frame of mind. There was especially strong 
feeling against the continuance of the favours shown to the 
Americans. The English merchants protested, and Sir James 
Stephen, one of the ablest men in England, wrote a remark- 
able book, entitled War in Disguise, or the Frauds of the 
Neutral Flag. Under this pressure from the merchants, and 
provided with such a good statement of the British side of the 
case, Mr Pitt decided to enforce the "Rule of War of 1756." 
Sir William Scott also at about the same time changed his 
mind, and in the case of the Essex decided that much more 
was required to break a voyage than he had thought necessary 
at the time of the decision in the case of the Polly. Seizures 
were now made right and left, and war against the United States 
existed in all but name by the act of England. The reply of 
the United States was a Non-importation Act, to take effect 
after nine months — "a dose of chicken-broth," as one member 



1/6 TJie Jeffersonian Republicans. [Chap. 

of Congress described it, "to be taken nine months hence." 
Before that time came, the matter had assumed a much more 
serious phase. 

On October 21st, 1805, the English won the memorable 
G t B "t " victory off Cape Trafalgar. In the following 
and Napoleon, December, Napoleon defeated England's allies 
^ °'*~' ° ■ in the great battle of Austerlitz. It was now 

evident that Napoleon could not attack Great Britain directly; 
but, on the other hand, neither Great Britain nor her allies 
could accomplish much against Napoleon on land. The two 
combatants thereupon seemed to have determined to starve one 
another into submission. In the carrying out of this policy, 
American ship-owners were the principal sufferers. The 
sympathies of the modern student of American history are 
somewhat divided as between the two belligerents. On the 
one hand, the Napoleonic earthquake made possible social and 
political reforms with which he is in full accord. On the other 
hand, the heroic resistance of the British people saved the 
New World as well as the Old World from the evils of a 
military despotism. 

The first step in this three-cornered contest — for the United 

States soon became an active participant, was 

blockade " and the issuiug an Order in Council (May i6th, 

the Berlin De- 1806), declaring a blockade of the coast of the 

Cree, 1806. ^ ■ ^ ?, -r-m rr-.! -11 

Continent from Brest to the Elbe. This blockade 
was enforced only between the Seine and Ostend, and was re- 
pealed as to the German coasts on September 27th of the same 
year. It is sometimes known as Fox's blockade, and was an 
effective blockade between the two points above named. Na- 
poleon began his part of the campaign of starvation by the Berlin 
Decree (November 21st, 1806). In this decree the British 
Islands are declared to be "in a state of blockade," no com- 
merce whatever being allowed with them. Furthermore, all 
trade in British merchandise was forbidden. On the first day 



VI.] TJie Belligerents and the Nentrals. lyy 

of the next month (December, 1806) a treaty was signed at 
London between the United States and Great Britain, which 
was designed to take the place of Jay's Treaty, soon to expire 
by limitation. This new treaty was very unfavourable to the 
United States. Among other things, it contained a provision 
that the "Rule of 1756 " would not be regarded as in force in 
respect to goods upon which a two per cent, ad valorem duty 
had been paid in the United States — provided it should not be 
returned as a drawback. There was no mention of impress- 
ment in the treaty, nor was indemnity for spoliations committed 
by the British provided for. It is difficult to see what reasons 
could have induced Monroe and Pinckney, the American ne- 
gotiators, to sign such a treaty. It is even more difficult to 
discover why they should have consented to receive a supple- 
mentary note to the effect that the British government would 
not carry out this treaty unless America should resist the Berlin 
Decree. Jefferson consulted with a few Senators and sent the 
treaty back to England without submitting it to the Senate. 

On January 7th, 1807, Great Britain's answer to the Berlin 
Decree appeared in the form of an Order in ^^^ British 
Council closing the coasting trade of the Conti- Orders in 
nent to neutrals — so far as ports under French °""" ' 
control were concerned. Late in the same year (November 1 1 th, 
1807) another Order in Council was issued, the effect of which 
was to secure the condemnation 9f any American vessel seized 
while on a voyage to any European port closed to British 
vessels, unless such vessel had first touched at a British port. 
Napoleon, on his part, in the Milan Decree (December 17th, 
1807) declared that any ship which had obeyed the above order 
w%s good prize if seized in any port under his control. At this 
time, Napoleon was the virtual masterof all the continental ports 
except those of Sweden, Norway, and Turkey, and the British 
were supreme on the ocean. These orders and decrees, therefore, 
provided for the speedy annihilation of American shipping and 
C. A. 12 



178 The Jeffersonian Republicans. [Chap. 

this seems to have been the object of the last British Order in 
Council if one may judge from a perusal of Mr Percival's cor- 
respondence on the subject. The official reason as stated was 
a desire to compel the United States to retaliate upon the 
French government. The vessels bearing these later Orders 
and Decrees reached the United States at about the same time. 
Jefferson had always maintained that nations could be com- 
pelled by appeals to their interests as effectively, and much 
more cheaply, as by appeals to their fears. He now had an 
opportunity to put his theories into practice. Meantime, how- 
ever, another matter had excited the prejudices of the Americans 
against Great Britain. This was the dispute as to impressment. 
Ever since the beginning of the contest between France 
and Great Britain in 1793, British sea captains 
pressment had Stopped American vessels and taken from 

ontroversy. them for service in the British navy British sub- 
jects found on board. If the matter had stopped there, it 
would have been bad enough, as the American government from 
the beginning denied the right of search. But the matter did 
not stop there. In the first place it was difficult to distinguish 
between an American and an Englishman. Indeed, the fate 
of many American seamen was a hard one during this period of 
strife. The English naval captain impressed him because he 
looked like an Englishman and the French authorities impris- 
oned him for the same reason. Secondly, the English govern- 
ment refused to recognize naturalization as doing away with 
the inalienable allegiance due from all British subjects. The 
doctrine of inalienable allegiance was then the recognized doc- 
trine of European nations; but it seemed a little strange that 
the British government should have held so strongly to it in 
view of the Acts of Parliament passed before the Revolution, 
naturalizing foreigners after short periods of residence in the 
colonies. It was, as a matter of fact, upon these Acts of Par- 
liament that the American practice of naturalization was based. 



VI.] The Impressment Controversy. 179 

There were abuses in the system, however, which no doubt 
irritated the English officers. English seamen deserted at every 
American port and were encouraged to do so in many States. 
They were provided with State naturalization papers, in some 
places as a matter of course. The whole crew of one British 
man-of-war is said to have deserted, and in a single port there 
were twelve British vessels detained at one time by reason of 
wholesale desertions. As the contest progressed, the larger 
American ports were blockaded by the British cruisers, which 
stopped every vessel going in or out and impressed seamen 
almost at will. There were at times several thousand native 
Americans serving on British war vessels. Finally on June 22, 
1807, the matter was brought to a crisis by the British ship 
Leopard firing on the American frigate Chesapeake. The 
Chesapeake was just out of the hands of the dockyard au- 
thorities, everything was in confusion, and it was only by 
means of a coal from the cook's galley that one gun was 
fired in return to save the vessel's honour before her flag, 
was hauled down. The Leopard's officers took from her 
three American citizens and one English deserter, and the 
Chesapeake then made the best of her way back to Norfolk, 
almost a wreck. A thrill of indignation swept through the 
United States only equalled by the indignation which had 
been aroused by the conflict at Lexington in 1775. The 
President issued a Proclamation ordering all British war vessels 
out of the waters of the United States, and forbidding any 
intercourse with them or the furnishing them with any supplies. 
Redress was demanded, and an attempt was made to couple 
with the Chesapeake affair the whole question of impress- 
ment. The British government disavowed the action of the 
Admiral by whose orders the outrage had been committed, 
but refused to give up impressment. The matter there- 
fore was left to embitter the already critical relations of the 
two countries. It was while affairs were in this unsettled 

12 — 2 



l8o TJie yejfersonian Republicans. [Chap. 

condition that the Order in Council of November nth, 1807, 
was issued. 

Jefferson recommended an embargo, and Congress, without 
debate of any importance, passed an Embargo 
Embargo Act (December 23, 1807) forbidding American 

^° "^^' vessels to leave the United States for foreign 

ports, and foreign vessels were not permitted to take any cargo 
except what was actually on board. The original act was amended 
from time to time in the direction of greater stringency. The last 
attempt to enforce it was by the passage of the Enforcement Act 
of January, 1808. The provisions of this act will serve to show 
the great difficulty experienced in trying to carry out this em- 
bargo policy. The Enforcement Act required, for example, that 
the owners of coasting vessels, before the cargo was placed on 
board, should give bonds to six times the value of the vessel and 
proposed cargo, obliging them to land the goods in the United 
States. The collectors of customs were authorized to seize goods 
" in any manner apparently on their way toward the territory of a 
foreign nation or the vicinity thereof. " Under this act, as some- 
one said, the collector of customs at St Alban's, Vermont, was 
authorized to seize a Vermont cow walking " toward the vicinity 
of Canada." The embargo brought about the temporary ruin 
of Jefferson's popularity and the revival of the Federalist party 
in New England. It also gave rise to a secession party in that 
section which played directly into the hands of England. 
Indeed Lord Castlereagh considered that in so far as the 
embargo injured the Republican party and helped the 
Federalists, it operated directly in the interests of Great 
Britain. From a political point of view, therefore, this policy 
was a failure. Furthermore, it compelled the Republicans to 
abandon the ground of 1798, and to adopt broad construc- 
tion theories in the interpretation of the Constitution. From 
a national stand-point this was a great gain, but from a Jeffer- 
sonian point of view it must be reckoned among the failures. 



VI.] Jefferson's Embargo Policy. i8i 

The embargo produced no effect on France — except as it 
served Napoleon for a useful pretext to justify Effect of the 
two later decrees. The earlier of these was embargo on 

England and 

issued at Bayonne (April 17,1808), and directed France, 
the sequestration of all vessels flying the United States flag on 
the ground that no American vessels could honestly navigate 
the ocean while the embargo was in force. The other decree, 
that of Rambouillet (18 10), directed the confiscation of all 
vessels then in French hands. As to Great Britain, however, 
the case was different. The embargo no doubt contributed to 
bring on a commercial crisis in England. Prices of Continental 
and American goods rose to prohibitive limits. At the same 
time, the markets of the world being largely closed to her, 
prices of English goods declined. The Americans, especially 
the New Englanders, began to manufacture for themselves and 
it seemed not impossible that the American market might be 
permanently lost. Since the sufferers among the manufactur- 
ing population in England had no political power, it may be 
said that the embargo as regards Great Britain was a com- 
plete failure. 

The sufferers from the embargo policy in America, unlike 
their fellow-sufferers in England, possessed direct 
political power and before long exercised it. The in the United 
embargo bore more heavily upon Jefferson's own *^*^^' 
political friends in Virginia than upon anyone else. Virginia's 
tobacco crop was her principal source of wealth ; and for several 
years the surplus over the needs of the American market was 
unsaleable. Many planters were ruined outright and many 
more were seriously crippled; but they bore their injuries 
with patience. Not so the New Englanders. The shipowner 
saw his vessels rotting at the wharves at the very moment when 
freights were at the highest. It was of no use to tell him that 
the government was protecting him from loss by compelling him 
to keep quiet. He was quite willing to take the risk and pocket 



1 82 The yeffersonian Republicans. [Chap. 

the profits, trusting to the government to secure indemnification 
in case his ship should be captured. But the New Englander 
was not the man to stand idly by and complain. At first he 
tried to evade the law. When the Enforcement Acts at last 
made that unprofitable, he turned his attention to manufacturing 
— and the manufacturing industries of New England date back 
to this time. During this period he omitted no opportunity to 
complain against the Jeffersonian government. The fruits of 
six years of conciliation were lost in a very short time. Portions 
of the country, indeed, seemed on the eve of rebellion, and it 
became evident to Jefferson by January 1809 — when he had 
but three months more to serve — that the embargo, whether it 
were a success, as he declared, or a failure, as his enemies 
asserted, must be repealed and that soon. 

Madison had meantime been elected President, and to him 

Re eai of Jeffersou left the practical conduct of affairs 

the embargo, during the last few months of his official life. 
' °^' Madison planned to have the embargo removed 

in June, 1809. But the subject of repeal was no sooner 
brought up in Congress, than it became evident that a majority 
was in favour of an immediate repeal, and the embargo was 
removed on March 4th, 1809, the day of Madison's inaugu- 
ration. In its place Congress provided for non-intercourse 
with France and Great Britain and their respective adherents 
and dependents. 

Historical writers have been accustomed to wax merry over 

- „ , Mr Jefferson's policy of substituting commercial 

Jefferson s -" r j o 

commercial restrictions for war; but it may well be asked if 

^° ''^^" the facts of the world's history from 1801 to 

1809 justify this view. The nations of Europe were at that 
time war-mad. Rules of conduct which had obtained for 
centuries were thrown to the winds by the master despot. 
The British nation, regarding itself as the saviour of the world, 
was disposed to treat the neutral as if he were one of the saved. 



VI.] Jejfersons Embargo Policy. 183 

It would seem that Jefferson deserves credit for keeping his 
country free from war at such a time. Finally, it must be re- 
membered that his policy was not the only policy that failed 
of its expected results in that time of delirium. It may also be 
pointed out that the Jeffersonian system of commercial warfare 
as a matter of fact brought about the repeal of the Orders 
in Council on June 17th, 1812 — one day before war was 
declared against Great Britain by the United States. Had the 
submarine cable suddenly come into being at that time, the 
War of 181 2 probably would not have taken place. 



CHAPTER VII. 

THE SECOND WAR OF INDEPENDENCE AND THE ERA OF 
GOOD FEELING. 

For a time events appeared to turn in Madison's favour. 

The begin- Tlie New Englandcrs ceased from sedition and 

ningof Madi- exerted themselves to make money by manu- 

Bon s Admin- _ -^ •' 

istration. facturing — for English goods were still excluded 

from the country; and, also, from a most profitable commerce 
which was carried on with the few European countries not under 
the control of either France or Great Britain. It even seemed for 
a moment as if England would enter again into friendly relations 
with the United States. A treaty was negotiated with Mr Erskine, 
the British Minister at Washington, on terms satisfactory to the 
American government. But Erskine had exceeded his power. 
The British government refused to ratify the treaty, and recalled 
their envoy; and Madison, who had suspended non-inter- 
course with Great Britain, was obliged to issue a Proclamation 
again imposing it. Erskine 's successor was a Mr Jackson, who 
had represented Great Britain at Copenhagen at the time of the 
seizure of the Danish fleet. He had then used language to the 
Prince Royal of Denmark for which King George III is said to 
have remarked that Jackson should have been kicked down- 
stairs. He now accused Madison of having knowingly deceived 
Erskine; and, repeating the assertion, Madison declined to 
receive any more communications from him. He returned 

J 84. 



Chap. VII.] Madison s First Term, 1809-13. 185 

home, delaying on the road to encourage the Federalists of 
New England in their intrigues against their government. 

Non-intercourse did not seem to be producing any marked 
effect on either of the belligerents. On May i st, commercial 
18 10, Congress substituted for it a bill known in policy modi- 
American political language as Macon's Bill, ^ ' ^ '°' 
No. 2. This provided that non-intercourse should cease. In 
case, however, one belligerent should revoke its decrees or 
orders and the other should not do so, it was provided that the 
President should reimpose non-intercourse against the of- 
feiiding nation. Then followed a most distressing diplomatic 
contest, in the course of which Madison was entirely over- 
reached by Napoleon. That master of duplicity offered to 
revoke his decrees on November ist, 18 10, so far as American 
shipping was concerned, provided Great Britain should 
rescind the Orders in Council before that day. Lord Welles- 
ley, the British Foreign Minister at the time, offered to re- 
scind the orders after Napoleon had revoked his decrees. 
Madison, however, understanding that the French decrees 
really were withdrawn, suspended non-intercourse with both 
countries. 

It will be remembered that the American government had 
interpreted the provisions of the Louisiana Pur- seizure of 
chase to include West Florida. But against this West Florida, 
the Spanish government had protested, and Tal- 
leyrand had stated that the Spanish interpretation was the true 
one. As long as Spain remained an independent nation, the 
Americans were not disposed to push their claim. Now (1810) 
it seemed probable that Spain would become a dependence 
of either France or Great B/itain. The occupation of West 
Florida by either of those powers would have menaced the 
control of the Mississippi by the United States. Madison 
decided to take possession of West Florida. A portion was 
occupied in 1810 and the remainder in 181 2. The United 



1 86 The Second War of Independence [Chap, 

States had not the shadow of a claim to East Florida, or that 
province would probably have been seized also. 

When Madison laid down the office of Secretary of State to 

become President he wished to promote Albert 
changes^ Gallatin — the ablest man in the cabinet — from 

the Treasury to the State Department. He was 
unable to do this, however, owing to the opposition of a faction 
led by Senator Smith of Maryland, whose brother Robert Smith 
was Secretary of the Navy. Gallatin had earned the enmity of 
this clique by condemning in severe terms the inefficient and 
wasteful management of the Navy Department by Robert Smith. 
So powerful were the Smiths, however, that the President was 
obliged, not only to put aside his plan as to Gallatin, but even 
to appoint Robert Smith Secretary of State. The latter could 
not write a proper state paper, and Madison was accustomed to 
write the important despatches himself, Robert Smith copying 
and signing them. The charter of the United States Bank was 
about to expire, and Gallatin desired to recharter it, for, as 
things stood, it was indispensable to the efficient management 
of the Treasury. Robert Smith did not oppose the plan in 
the cabinet, but with his brother's aid secured its rejection 
by Congress. This was more than Gallatin could bear, and he 
forwarded his resignation to the President. Now, at last, the 
patient Madison was aroused. He asked Gallatin to remain, 
removed Smith, and requested Monroe, who had opposed the 
government since the rejection of his treaty with England, to 
take the vacant post. Monroe accepted, to the indignation of 
many of his friends, and again entered political life. 

During these years of embargo and non-intercourse the 

Republicans had suffered many defeats in Nev/ 
The Gerry- England. Thev now had control in Massachu- 

mander. ° •' 

setts. To perpetuate their hold on the upper 
house of the legislature of that State, they rearranged the sena- 
torial districts to secure as many Republican districts, and hence 



vii.] Madison's First Term, 1809-13. 187 

as many senators, as possible. Some of the new districts were 
of a most extraordinary shape, resembling in outline those 
quaint monsters, salamanders and the like, with which mediaeval 
map-makers were wont to dot the unknown parts of the sea. 
To these the Federalists gave the name of gerrymander, as a 
satire on the Republican governor, Elbridge Gerry, who signed 
the bill. In this connection Gerry is still remembered among 
all English-speaking peoples. 

In May, 181 1, the American frigate President and the 
British sloop-of-war Little Belt, owing to some _, 

^ . ' & The President 

misunderstanding not now to be discovered, fired and Little Beit, 
on each other in the darkness of the early evening ^ "' 
and the Little Belt was badly crippled. This affair recon- 
ciled the American people to accept reparation for the Chesa- 
peake outrage, and accordingly the American citizens seized 
by the Leopard in 1807 were restored to their country. To 
Americans of the present day, this whole matter of impress- 
ment seems extraordinary. The press-gang saved the British 
government a few thousand pounds in seamen's wages, at the 
cost of great hardship to Englishmen and oftentimes to their 
families as well. It did more than anything else to keep alive 
the spirit of resentment on the part of Americans towards the 
British nation, which was one of the principal causes of the 
War of 181 2. Another cause of that war was the conviction, 
which obtained especially among the people of the North-west, 
that the British authorities in Canada were at the bottom of the 
Indian troubles of the period. 

Among the Indians of Indiana Territory were two brothers, 
named Tecumthe and "the Prophet." Under 

. ^ The Battle 

their lead the Indians protested against the of Tippecanoe, 
United States securing more land in that region ^^^°' 
from individual tribes. They maintained, on the contrary, that 
the land belonged to the Indians as a whole, and could 
only be acquired by general consent. Following a refusal 



1 88 TJie Second War of hidependence. [Chap. 

to acknowledge the justness of this argument, murders and 
thefts became common. The settlers in the North-west were 
alarmed. William Henry Harrison was then the governor of 
that region. Gathering a small army composed of regulars and 
volunteers, he marched to Tecumthe's town of Tippecanoe. 
While encamped near that place he was attacked at night by 
a large body of Indians, who were beaten off with great loss. 
They then abandoned their village. Tecumthe, who was absent 
at the moment of the battle of Tippecanoe (1810), joined 
the British in Canada, and this gave colour to the assertions 
of the Americans that he was a British emissary. 

A few days before this conflict the Twelfth Congress met at 

Washington. The House of Representatives was 
ciareY 1812 "^^^ controlled by Henry Clay, John C. Calhoun, 

and other young men, to whom the theories 
of Jefferson and the founders of the Republican party were 
hardly more than traditions. They had had little or no part in 
the passing of the embargo, and believed that war with Great 
Britain was the only way out of the difficulties which surrounded 
-the United States. They won the President to their side — he 
was now anxious as to his re-nomination — and war was declared 
against England on June i8th, 1812. The events which led up 
to the war have been narrated in the previous pages. Perhaps 
war was necessary, as Clay asserted. It is not probable that it 
would have taken place, however, had the British government 
and people treated the Americans as equals. For example, 
Mr Canning, in conversation and in his official correspondence 
with the American ministers at London, used language which 
made forgiveness without humiliation practically impossible. 
The following extract from a speech made in the House of 
Commons will serve to show the tone adopted towards the 
American people by at least one British minister, and that 
a conciliatory man. This diplomatist asserted in 181 2 that 
"generally speaking, they [the Americans] were not a people 



VII.] Causes of the War. 189 

we should be proud to acknowledge as our relations." Later, 
in 1 8 13, Lord Liverpool, the Prime Minister, declared that 
America " ought to have looked to this country as the guardian 
power to which she was indebted not only for her comforts, not 
only for her rank in the scale of civilization, but for her very 
existence." Bearing these speeches in mind, it is easier to 
understand the exultation of the Americans over the capture of 
the Guernere by the Constitution, and, also, the surprise ex- 
pressed in the English papers when it was announced that 
English frigates must sail in pairs for safety against American 
"line-of-battle-ships in disguise." The War of i8i2waswaged 
by one free people against another free people in the interest 
of Napoleon, the real enemy of them both. It diverted 
England's strength at a time when it was sorely needed in 
Europe, and it might have been prevented at any time before 
181 2 by a few conciliatory words followed by conciliatory deeds. 
It is impossible to formulate even a rough estimate of the 
strength of the two combatants. It is equally 

^ _ ^ ■' Campaigns 

impossible to state the reasons for the failure of 1812, 1813, 
of both parties to accomplish their objects. The ^""^ ^^'4- 
people of the North-west regarded the conquest of Canada as 
the only means by which an end could be put to the Indian 
troubles, and that conquest was begun in a spirit of rashness 
and with an amount of ignorance of the character of the 
undertaking which shows how completely the lessons of the 
Revolutionary War had been forgotten. Several half-trained 
armies, led by incapable generals, Hull, Dearborn, Van Ren- 
sselaer, and Smyth, crossed the border. The British General 
Brock and other able officers, with a small but efficient body 
of troops, soon put an end to the invasion and began a counter 
attack on the United States (18 12). It is to be regretted that 
the British were aided at this time by a considerable body of 
Indians. A victory of a green-timber navy under Perry (18 13) 
enabled the Americans to regain control of the original territory 



190 TJie Second War of Independeiice. [Chap. 

of the United States, The abdication of Napoleon (April, 
1814) freed the hands of the British, and the United States was 
invaded from three separate directions. On the American 
side the army was now placed in better hands. Jacob Brown, 
a Quaker with slight experience in the field, was given com- 
mand in the North. He was a man of energy and was ably 
seconded by his two brigadiers, Winfield Scott and Ripley. 
There were several conflicts, those at Lundy's Lane and Fort 
Erie being creditable to both sides. Indeed, the former, where 
a small force of Americans opposed about the same number of 
Wellington's veterans in the darkness of night, is the most 
extraordinary conflict of the war. But Brown accomplished 
little more than to hold his own. Meantime a well-appointed 
army under Prevost had marched southward on the line of 
Lake Champlain. But MacDonough's victory gave the control 
of the water to the Americans, and Prevost was obliged to 
return to Canada. 

The same summer (18 14) witnessed the burning of Wash- 
„. „ . ington by a force commanded by General Ross 

The Burning . 

of Washing- and Admiral Cochrane. Landing on the banks 
ton, I 14. ^^ ^^ Patuxent, the British marched to Washing- 

ton through a sparsely-inhabited country, meeting with only 
slight opposition at Bladensburg. They remained at Washing- 
ton long enough to burn the public buildings — save one, and 
then retired in great haste to their shipping. This incendiarism 
was perpetrated by the orders of the commanders, and under 
their personal direction. It was said to be in retaliation for the 
burning of the Assembly House at Toronto (then called York) ; 
but that act had been the work of private soldiers, and had 
been disavowed by the commanding officer : and it had already 
been amply avenged by the burning of Buffalo by the British. 
The destruction of the public buildings at Washington aroused 
indignation in London — one paper sorrowfully remarking: 
"The Cossacks spared Paris, but we spared not the capital of 



VII.] The Campaigns <?/ i8 13-15. 191 

America." A subsequent attack on Baltimore was repulsed 
with some loss to the British, including that of General Ross 
the commander. 

The last serious conflict of the war was the unsuccessful 
campaign against New Orleans, December 7, Jackson's 
1814-Jan. 8, 1815, by a formidable force led NtwOri°eans, 
by General Pakenham, one of Wellington's sub- 1814-15. 
ordinates. The American commander in that quarter was 
General Andrew Jackson — a man of great energy. At first he 
seems to have been very dilatory. But when at last he under- 
stood the nature of the task, he took prompt and effectual 
measures for resistance. The American artillery practice proved 
to be superior to that of the British, and it was due to this fact 
and to the great difficulties offered by the physical conformation 
of the country in the vicinity of New Orleans that the attempt 
ended in disaster. The last attack in this campaign was made 
two weeks after the signing of the treaty of peace at Ghent. 

It was on the water, however, that the Americans contrib- 
uted most to the history of warfare. The Ameri- ^^ ^ 

■' _ The Lo7i- 

can sea-going navy consisted in 181 2 of three stuutzon and. 
large frigates, known as " forty-fours, " four smaller ^"''^''"''^^■ 
frigates, rated at from thirty-two to thirty-eight guns each, and 
a number of sloops-of-war and brigs mounting from sixteen to 
eighteen guns. There were about a dozen vessels in all, com- 
pared with more than eight hundred on the British naval list. 
It seemed to be the height of folly to send these vessels to sea 
to be picked up one after another by the fleets of Great Britain, 
and Madison desired to use them as guard-ships in the larger 
ports. It was not easy, however, to restrain the ardour of 
officers like Decatur and Hull, who once at sea were not likely 
to regain the shelter of a port without a fight of some kind. 
One of the first to get to sea was the Constitution, commanded 
by Captain Hull, nephew to the coward who had surrendered 
Detroit. While on a voyage from Annapolis to New York, he 



192 TJie Second War of Independence. [Chap. 

fell in with a British squadron of five ships, carrying from sixty- 
four to thirty-two guns each. From sundown on July 17th to 
the morning of July 20th the squadron chased the single ship 
through alternate calms, breezes, and squalls, occasionally get- 
ting near enough to try the range of a gun or two. In the end, 
Hull saved his ship, after one of the most memorable chases in 
naval annals, and reached Boston in safety. Sailing thence on 
August 2nd, without any orders, except the old ones to go to 
New York, he cruised about until August 19th, when he sighted 
the Briti sh frigate Guerriere. The Constitution was one hundred 
and seventy-three feet long and forty-four feet wide. She carried 
thirty-two "long 24's" and twenty "32 lb." carronades, or fifty- 
two guns in all. Her sides were very solid for a ship of that 
period, and she was very heavily timbered throughout. The 
Guerriere was one hundred and fifty-six feet long and forty feet 
wide. She carried thirty " long i8's," two "long i2's,"and six- 
teen "32 lb." corronades, or forty-eight guns in all. She was 
not as strongly built as her opponent, and not only had four 
guns less, but al%o threw a much lighter broadside. In thirty 
minutes she lay a wreck on the water, with seventy-nine of her 
crew killed or wounded; and she sank soon after her men had 
been removed. On October 17th, the American sloop-of-war 
Wasp encountered the British brig Frolic. The Wasp threw a 
slightly lighter broadside than the Frolic, and was six feet longer. 
Both were rated as carrying eighteen guns. In forty-three 
minutes after the first gun was fired the ^/v/zV was a wreck, with 
ninety of her crew of one hundred and ten killed or wounded. 
Before the end of the year two more British " thirty-eights," the 
Java and Macedonia, had struck to the Constitutio?i and U?iited 
States. 

The loss of three frigates was, in itself, nothing to the 

Effects of English navy. But the effect of these battles 

these sea- can be Compared only with that produced by the 

^ ^" Monitor-Merrimac fight of a half-century later. 



vii.] The War on the Sea. 193 

One English paper proposed that British frigates should run 
away from the Constitution on the ground that she was a 
"seventy-four," a "line-of-battle-ship in disguise." There can 
be no question that the Constitution, President, and United 
States were the most powerful frigates then afloat. They had 
been designed with that precise object in view, as armoured 
cruisers are designed now-a-days. The guns of the Co7istitution, 
on August 19th, 1812, sounded the death-knell of impressment 
and the right of search. It is not necessary to enumerate the 
other naval encounters of the war, except the notable capture 
of the American frigate Chesapeake by the Shannon, and that of 
the American sloop-of-war Argus by the Pelican. Most of the 
national vessels were kept in port by the British blockading 
squadrons after 181 2. 

During the later years of the war, the American privateers 
continued their hazardous calling. I'hey ran the 
blockade almost with impunity, and established ^"^^ Amen- 

^ _ can privateers. 

in turn what might be described as a "priva- 
teer blockade " of portions of the British Islands. Many of 
these privateers were fine large vessels, carrying an armament 
as heavy as that of a sloop-of-war, and quite the match of 
an ordinary sixteen-gun brig. Though the fastest vessels then 
afloat, they were nearly all captured sooner or later. But the 
loss of one vessel seemed to stimulate the owner to construct 
another and better one. Some of them were built and placed 
on the ocean within sixty days. In the course of the war 
they captured more than two thousand five hundred British 
vessels, about one-half of which were recaptured while on their 
way to America. In the winter of 18 14-15, the privateers 
infested the British coasts to such an extent that a shipowner 
was fortunate if he could insure his ship for ten or even thirteen 
per cent, for a run across the Irish Channel. At one time they 
hovered about the mouth of the Thames, and one little schooner 
of two hundred tons captured a despatch boat in the Straits of 
C.A. 13 



194 The Second War of Independence. [Chap. 

Dover. The great lines of commerce were also carefully 
watched. One English ship captain reported that his vessel 
was three times captured and as many times recaptured on a 
voyage across the Atlantic, adding that he saw no less than ten 
privateers on that short passage. Profitable commerce was 
difficult under such conditions; and the British merchants now 
spoke of the United States as a "power whose maritime 
strength we have hitherto impolitically held in contempt." 
Mr John Wilson Croker, at that time Secretary of the Admiralty, 
threatened with condign punishment an enterprising merchant 
captain who had abandoned his convoy when within sight of 
the British coast, and had been captured. "Such illegal acts," 
said Mr Croker, "are attended with injurious consequences to 
the trade of the country." 

The contest between Napoleon and Russia had been renewed 
The Treat in June, 1812, four days after the declaration of 

of Ghent, war against England by the American Congress. 

^ ''*■ The principal reason for this new conflict be- 

tween France and Russia was the refusal of the latter power to 
enforce the continental system against the Americans or to 
compel the other Baltic powers like Sweden to enforce it. The 
Czar saw with some dismay England and the United States, 
which should have both joined him against France, engaging in 
a contest with one another. Mr John Quincy Adams, son of 
John Adams, was at that time American Minister to Russia. 
In September, 18 12, while Napoleon was at Moscow, Mr Adams 
was informed of the Czar's concern and of his desire to mediate 
between Great Britain and the United States. On learning of 
this offer, Madison sent Gallatin and Bayard of Delaware, a 
Federalist, to act jointly with Adams in any negotiation which 
might ensue. But England, though anxious to give no offence 
to Russia, could not permit one of the Baltic powers to mediate 
in a matter which concerned the rights of neutrals. The offer 
was therefore declined, and this same answer was returned to a 



vii.] TJie Treaty of GJicnt, 1814. 195 

second offer of mediation. Lord Castlereagh, the British 
Foreign Minister, at the same time announced his willingness to 
negotiate directly with the Americans. But it was not until the 
summer of 18 14 that the negotiators met for the first time. 
The American Commissioners meanwhile had been reinforced 
by the addition to their number of Henry Clay and Jonathan 
Russell. It seems probable that this moment to begin negotia- 
tions was chosen by the British government in the belief that 
the events of the campaign of 18 14 would make the Americans 
more pliable and more willing to surrender territory along the 
Great Lakes. But the retreat of Prevost and the defence made 
by Brown at Fort Erie put an end to any hope of an accession 
of territory, and the negotiation was suddenly brought to a 
conclusion. The treaty, which was signed at Ghent on De- 
cember 24th, 1814, was emphatically a treaty of peace, in that 
it settled none of the questions about which the war ostensibly 
had been waged. Impressment was not even mentioned in it, 
and the fall of Napoleon had done away with the continental 
system. Furthermore, the xAmerican right to the fisheries and 
the British right to the free navigation of the Mississippi, both 
of which had been discussed in the course of the negotiation, 
were left for future settlement. News of the peace and of the 
repulse of Pakenham at New Orleans reached Washington at 
the same moment. The latter served to make the treaty more 
palatable. Everywhere the rejoicings were loud and from the 
heart. 

Indeed, it was time that the war was ended, for com- 
missioners from several New England States were ^^ „ 

° The Hart- 

then at Washington to lay proposals before the ford conven- 

government, which looked to a dissolution of the *'°"' ^ ^'^~^^' 

Union. New England had borne its full share in the war. This 

can easily be seen from a brief statement of the contributions 

of Massachusetts and Virginia. The former contained in 1 8 1 o, 

the census year, about seven hundred thousand inhabitants. 

13—2 



196 The Second War of Independence. [Chap. 

Virginia is credited in the same census with nine hundred and 
seventy thousand inhabitants, including five hundred and fifty 
thousand negro slaves. The two States were represented in Con- 
gress by twenty and twenty-three members respectively — that 
being also the basis of the apportionment of direct taxes; and 
it was supposed to represent the relative strength and capacity 
of the two States. Furthermore, Massachusetts contributed four 
times as much money to the support of the war as Virginia. 
She furnished more men to the United States armies than 
Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina combined — more 
men indeed than any State except New York. But the war was 
unpopular in New England, and the leading men there, mostly 
of the Federalist party, had no confidence in the administration. 
At the suggestion of the Federalist chiefs, who seem to have 
adopted Madison's Virginia Resolutions of 1798 as their 
text, delegates met at Hartford (December, 1814-January, 
18 1 5) and adopted a proposition to permit the New England 
States to retain the proceeds of the national taxes collected 
therein for the purpose of paying State armies. The conven- 
tion further laid down, in words which must have sounded 
unpleasantly familiar to Jefferson and Madison, that the States 
must be the judges and execute their own decisions when the 
federal government exceeded its powers, on the ground that 
there was "no common umpire." Never was a political revo- 
lution more ill-timed. The treaty of peace was then on its way 
to America, and six days before the Hartford Convention 
adjourned. General Jackson won the Battle of New Orleans. 
The Commissioners, sent to Washington to arrange for the 
division of taxes, hurried home amid the jeers of the Republican 
press. The administration at once leaped into great popularity. 
The War of 18 12 settled two great questions within the 
United States. For the first time in its history, 
...^t!i^'*^ °^ the American people in 1811^ realized its nation- 

the War. jr jr j 

ality. The party favourable to England lost 



vii.] The Hartford Conveiition. 197 

credit even in its stronghold. After 18 15 the Federalist party 
steadily declined until in 1820 it cast not one electoral vote. 
Since 1815 the United States has held resolutely aloof from 
foreign complications, and the American people, which up to 
that time had been interested in European affairs, seemed 
suddenly to lose all interest in them. They ceased to be 
provincial and viewed affairs thenceforward from a national 
stand-point. The War of 18 12, therefore, has been often and 
correctly called the Second War of Independence. 

The war left the United States in a very critical condition 
so far as the finances were concerned. The ^ ^ , ., ^. 

End of Madi- 

revenue of the federal government was derived son's Ad- 
almost entirely from duties on imports. During "^'"'^tration. 
the last few years of embargo, non-intercourse, and war, there 
had been hardly any goods imported and in consequence the 
revenues of the government had seriously diminished. Con- 
gress during those years had been singularly inefficient and had 
refused to pass any effective measures for restoring the credit 
of the government. With the return of peace, new forces at 
once came into existence. Importations were made on a large 
scale and Congress consented in 18 16 to re-charter the United 
States Bank for twenty years. The same year saw the passage 
of the first of a series of tariffs designed to protect the makers 
of textile goods, and Madison retired from office in 181 7 
leaving affairs in a most satisfactory condition. His succes- 
sor was James Monroe, of Virginia, who during the last few 
years had been the most prominent man in the cabinet. 

The old issues which had divided parties were now extinct. 
The younger Republicans had adopted nation- xh " e 
alist principles without losing their popular Good Feeu 
instincts. The older Republicans, discredited '"^■" 
by the failure of the embargo policy and abandoned by their 
leaders, were obliged to follow the majority of the party. The 
Federalist party was hardly more than a faction during Monroe's 



198 TJie Second War of Independence. [Chap. 

first term, and was practically extinct by the time of his 
second inauguration (1820). This period of cessation from 
party strife is known as the " Era of Good Feeling." In times 
of political stagnation personal intrigue takes the place of party 
action. So it was in this case; but fortunately it is not neces- 
sary to describe any of these intrigues until we approach the 
election of 1824. 

Monroe was well fitted to lead the nation in the peaceful 

Monr e's timcs now approaching. With ordinary abilities 

Administra- he Combined a large experience in affairs both at 

tion, I 17-25. home and abroad. He had shown, too, strength 
to resist unwise popular demands and a capacity to rise above 
a mere desire for personal popularity. He had more sense of 
dignity than Jefferson, or even Madison, and he brought back to 
public life a part, at least, of the decorum of Washington's time. 
Like the first President, Monroe made progresses through the 
country and in this way did something to bring the federal 
government before the eyes of the pveople and at the same time 
to win their love and respect. The difficulties of his time were 
mainly with the outside world, with the rebellious Spanish 
American colonies, with Spain, and with Great Britain. The 
relations with the last-named power were still far from cordial, 
but they were more friendly than at any other time since 1775. 
The Treaty of Ghent was hardly more than a basis for 

„ , ,. further negotiation. In i8is the two countries 

Relations ° ^ 

with Great entered into a commmercial convention which 

" ^^"' afforded slight relief as to the West India trade, 

but contained an important provision to secure the abolition of 
discriminating duties and charges in either country against the 
other. This convention was limited to four years, but was ex- 
tended for ten years longer in 1818. As to the fisheries, some 
of the rights claimed by the United States under the Treaty of 
1783 were surrendered as the price of a recognition of the per- 
manent character of the rest. The northern boundary of the 



VII.] Foreign Relations. 199 

United States was fixed at the forty-ninth parallel between the 
Lake of the Woods and the Rocky Mountains. An attempt 
was made to reach some agreement with a view to the suppres- 
sion of the slave-trade; but, owing to the sensitiveness of the 
Americans as to the exercise of the right of search, no arrange- 
ment was made until many years later. 

The seizure of West Florida in 18 10 and 181 2 has been 
already mentioned. Since that time the United , , 

•' Jackson s 

States had sought with great pertinacity to Florida Cam- 
purchase East Florida from Spain. But that p^'^"' '^'^• 
monarchy, though too weak to govern the province itself, 
refused to sell it to the United States. Smuggling was con- 
stantly carried on over the boundary line, and the United 
States found it very difficult to keep the Southern Indians in 
order without pursuing them across the frontier. In 1818, 
General Andrew Jackson followed a hostile band over the 
border, and finding that the Indians received aid from the 
Spanish settlements, he captured two of them, St Marks and 
Pensacola. He also executed two British subjects, Arbuthnot 
and Ambrister, who seemed to be intriguing with the Indians 
against the United States. The government, at the moment, 
was engaged in negotiations for the purchase of Florida. It 
did not approve Jackson's conduct, and handed the captured 
posts back to the Spanish authorities. John C. Calhoun, then 
Secretary of War, asserted at a cabinet meeting that Jackson 
deserved to be court-martialled for disobedience. Many years 
afterward, the revelation of his attitude at this time brought 
about a rupture between Jackson and Calhoun, which had the 
most important results to Calhoun and to the American people. 
Henry Clay endeavoured in Congress to have Jackson brought 
to account for his arbitrary proceedings in Florida, and his hos- 
tility to Jackson also caused Clay much annoyance in later years. 
Jackson's raid really furthered the negotiation which John 
Quincy Adams, Monroe's Secretary of State, was then carrying 



200 The Second War of Independence. [Chap. 

on. Spain at last consented to sell what she could not defend, 

and in 1819 a treaty was signed at Washington. 

The "Florida gy ^j^jg tj-gaty Spain abandoned all claim to the 

Treaty," 1819. •' / ' 1 

Floridas and to all territory north and east of a 
line running up the Sabine River and thence in an irregular 
manner to the Rocky Mountains in latitude 42°, and along that 
parallel to the Pacific Ocean. The United States, on its part, 
abandoned the claim to Texas, and agreed to pay five million 
dollars to its own citizens on account of Spanish spoliations. 
This treaty was not ratified by Spain until 1821, being held 
suspended, as it were, over the United States to secure its good 
behaviour in the Spanish colonial crisis then prevailing. 
Jackson was appointed Governor of Florida, and grufifiy took 
possession in July, 182 1, imprisoning the Spanish governor 
because he would not hand over the records to the new master. 
The people of the United States had watched the long 

struggle between the Spanish colonists and the 
The " Mon- Spanish government with great interest. These 

roe Doctrine. ir o o 

colonies had rebelled (1808) originally against 
the Napoleonic regime in Spain. Returning to their allegiance 
upon the restoration of the old monarchy, they had again 
rebelled when their restored masters re-imposed the Spanish 
colonial system. The matter now had reached a stage at which 
it seemed desirable for the United States to act, but beyond 
recognizing the rebels as belligerents the government did not 
go at that time. In March, 1822, Monroe recommended Con- 
gress to recognize the belligerent colonies as independent States. 
This was done (May, 1822) by the appropriation of money to 
defray the expenses of diplomatic missions to '' the independent 
nations " on the American continent. The United States thus 
led the way in the recognition of these new peoples. The next 
year (1823) the "Holy Alliance " seemed to be about to inter- 
fere in the contest in the interests of Spain. Russia also chose 
this time to begin the colonization of the western shores of 



VII.] The Mom'oe Doctrme. 201 

North America. The closing of the Spanish American ports to 
foreign commerce would greatly interfere with the foreign trade, 
not of those colonies or States alone, but of the United States 
and of Great Britain as well. The interests of the two English- 
speaking nations were one. Mr George Canning was once 
more at the head of the British foreign office, owing to the 
suicide of Lord Castlereagh. Adopting for the moment a most 
conciliatory tone, he asked Mr Richard Rush — then American 
Minister at London — if it were not feasible for the United 
States and Great Britain to act together in opposing this project 
of the "Holy Alliance." The time was not yet ripe for such 
co-operation, but the two governments acted in harmony. In 
his Seventh Annual Message (December, 1823), Mr Monroe 
used the following language, whose import was unmistakable : 

"The occasion has been judged proper for asserting, as a 
principle in which the rights and interests of the United States 
are involved, that the American continents, by the free and 
independent condition which they have assumed and maintain, 
are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future 
colonization by any European powers. 

"We owe it, therefore, to candour, and to the amicable re- 
lations existing between the United States and those powers 
[the members of the 'Holy Alliance'], to declare, that we 
should consider any attempt on their part to extend their sys- 
tem to any portion of this hemisphere as dangerous to our 
peace and safety. With the existing colonies or dependencies 
of any European power we have not interfered, and shall not 
interfere. But with the governments who have declared their 
independence, and maintained it, and whose independence we 
have on great consideration and on just principles acknowl- 
edged, we could not view any interposition for the purpose of 
oppressing them, or controlling in any other manner their 
destiny, by any European power, in any other light than as 



202 The Second War of Independence. [Chap. 

the manifestation of an unfriendly disposition toward the 
United States." 

These famous sentences, which have immortalized Monroe's 
name, and given him a place in American 
o'?^""'"^'^ history which he did not otherwise attain, were 

the embodiment of previous statements and of 
a policy well established at that time in America. Monroe's 
courageous act in declining Canning's overtures and defying 
the "Holy Alliance " single-handed merited the renown which 
has ever since attached to the enunciation of the Monroe 
Doctrine. Mr Canning, on his part, caused the French gov- 
ernment to be informed that the use of force by the " Holy 
Alliance " would at once lead to the recognition of the inde- 
pendence of the Spanish colonies by Great Britain. The 
projects of the "Holy Alliance " fell dead. With this matter 
the old international policy of the United States may be 
said to have terminated. At almost the same time, the 
internal struggle over protection and the extension of slavery, 
which was to dominate the politics of the next half-century, 
began. 

Like so many important events in the world's history, the 
„, ... contest as to the limitation of slave territory, 

The Missouri -' ' 

Compromises, which began at this time, was largely due to 
I 20-21. accident. Mason and Dixon's line, separating 

the slave and the free States in the East, ran sixteen miles south 
of the fortieth parallel. By the Ordinance of 1787, the Ohio 
River formed the northern limit of slave territory in the district 
between the Alleghanies and the Mississippi. The course of 
that river is to the south of west, and it joins the Mississippi 
River in about the thirty-seventh degree of latitude. Louisiana, 
acquired in 1803, contained two centres of population. New 
Orleans and St Louis. Slavery prevailed in the Province of 
Louisiana as in all Spanish colonies. The country dependent 
on New Orleans was admitted to the Union in 181 2, under the 



VII.] TJie Missouri Compromises. 203 

name of Louisiana, as a slave State, without any objection being 
raised on that ground. In 18 19 the question of admitting 
Missouri, as the country dependent on St Louis was now 
named, came before Congress. The southern limit of the pro- 
posed State of Missouri was 36° 30' north latitude, the northern 
limit about 40° 30', and it was separated by the Mississippi 
from the free State of Illinois, which had been admitted to the 
Union in 1818. Some persons in the North thought that 
slavery should not be permitted at all in territory acquired at 
the expense of the nation. Others thought that the southern 
boundary of Missouri (36° 30'. north latitude), which would be 
practically an extension of the Ohio River line, should be a 
line separating the Louisiana Purchase into free and slave terri- 
tories. The matter was further complicated by the fact that 
slavery existed in Missouri. What should be done with the 
slaves already there ? How could they be set free without loss 
to their masters or cost to the nation, or without disturbing the 
social conditions of the proposed State? The problem was a 
difficult one to solve. The slave-holding representatives cared 
much more about the matter than the Northern members, and 
a compromise was arranged. By this settlement (1820) Mis- 
souri was to be admitted as a slave State, but slavery was 
"for ever" prohibited in the remainder of the Louisiana Pur- 
chase lying north of thirty-six degrees and thirty minutes, the 
southern boundary of the new State. When, however, the 
constitution of Missouri came before Congress in the next year 
(182 1) it was found to contain a clause forbidding the entrance 
of free blacks to the State. As the Constitution (under the 
interpretation then put upon it) guaranteed certain rights to the 
citizens of the United States, the clause could not be allowed 
to stand. This matter too was compromised by Congress 
admitting Missouri under the proposed constitution, with the 
proviso that no interpretation should ever be placed on that 
clause which should in any way diminish the rights of citizens 



204 The Second War of Independence. [Chap. 

of the United States. TheseMissouri Compromises postponed 
the conflict with the slave power for a whole generation and 
thus may be considered to have been justifiable. 

Monroe's first administration was in many respects the most 
successful in the history of the country. He was re-elected Pres- 
ident in 1 82 1 without opposition, receiving two hundred and 
thirty-one of the two hundred and thirty-two electoral votes. 
The one odd vote was thrown away by a New Hampshire elector, 
who was determined, so runs the story, that no one save Wash- 
ington should enjoy the honour of an unanimous election. As 
to Monroe's successor there was no such unanimity of opinion. 

When one speaks of the " Era of Good Feeling " one thinks 
more particularly of the people as a whole. 
ofTslT ^^^'^*'°" Among the leading politicians there was no good 
feeling at all. Monroe had gathered about him 
four of the ablest men in the country : J. Q. Adams, Secretary 
of State; W. H.Crawford, Secretary of the Treasury; J. C. 
Calhoun, Secretary of War; and William Wirt, Attorney- 
General. The first three of these aspired to succeed Monroe 
at the end of his second term. Two other men, Henry Clay 
of Kentucky and Andrew Jackson of Tennessee, also decided to 
be candidates. Crawford was the most active of them all. He 
was a skilful intriguer, and turned the Treasury department into 
a strong political machine. To aid him in this business he 
secured (1820) the passage of an Act limiting the tenure of 
civil offices to four years. This enabled him to drop from 
the Treasury all officials who were unfavourable to his preten- 
sions. His action marks the beginning of the systematic use of 
the federal patronage for party purposes. Crawford was recog- 
nized by a factional congressional caucus as the " regular " can- 
didate for the presidency. Calhoun abandoned his presidential 
aspirations for the moment to accept an assured election to the 
vice-presidency. Adams was put forward as a candidate by the 
New England legislatures; and Clay, in a similar manner, was 



VII.] The Election of 1824. 205 

nominated by the legislatures of five States, including that of 
his own State. Jackson was nominated by two State legisla- 
tures, those of Tennessee and Pennsylvania. He represented 
in his own person the honest hard-working masses; and to the 
amazement of nearly everyone, received more electoral votes 
than any other candidate. As he had not attracted a majority, 
however, the election went to the House of Representatives, 
which was confined in its choice to the three candidates who 
had received the largest number of votes. Clay stood fourth 
on the list, and therefore could not be chosen. He had many 
friends in the House of which he was Speaker, and, using his in- 
fluence in favour of Adams, that candidate was elected. There 
was no constitutional reason to prevent the Representatives 
from electing whichever of the three highest candidates they 
chose — although now-a-days public sentiment would probably 
require the choice of the first on the list. There is no 
reason whatever for supposing that Adams and Clay made any 
bargain. It was unfortunate, however, that Adams offered Clay 
the position of Secretary of State, and that Clay accepted the 
office. There are always persons who insist on finding evil 
motives for the actions of great men. John Randolph was one 
of these, and he lost no time in denouncing what he termed 
"a combination of the Puritan and the black-leg." Jackson 
on his part stated his opinion of the matter when he declared 
that Clay was "the Judas of the West." The close of 
Monroe's administration was in every respect the end of the 
"Era of Good Feeling." 

John Quincy Adams was an honest, upright statesman; 
but the story of his administration (18215-20) , „ », 

-' ^ -^ -'^ J. Q. Adams's 

is melancholy and soon told. It began in a Administra- 
cloud caused by charges of " corruption and **°"' ' ^^'^^ 
bargain," which were never proved. They were constantly 
reiterated until even those who knew them to be false must 
have begun to doubt the evidence of their own senses. The 



2o6 The Second War of Independence. [Chap. 

first Congress of Adams's administration was lukewarm, the 
second was decidedly hostile. The public suspicions were 
kept on the alert by constant and causeless inquiries and 
investigations into the actions of public officials. Everything 
that Adams proposed was proposed either too soon or too late. 
He suggested in general terms a vast system of internal im- 
provements. This was displeasing to the Southerners, who 
were now turning away from a national policy and beginning 
to formulate the doctrine of "States-rights." Even in matters 
of foreign policy, Adams's own peculiar province, everything 
went amiss. 

Among other proposals of the time was one for a Congress 

of all the American Republics to be held at 
lations'.^" ^' Panama. This did not originate with the United 

States, but that government was naturally asked 
to send delegates to the meeting. The Southerners, fearing 
lest slavery might be discussed there, opposed the scheme. 
Nevertheless, delegates were sent, and the Congress proved a 
flat failure. Nor was Adams's conduct of the relations with 
European powers more successful. A series of accidents re- 
sulted in the closing of the British West India ports to Ameri- 
can vessels. Gallatin was sent to England to negotiate on this 
business, but Canning curtly declined to discuss it at all. 

The only important legislative achievement of the four 

years was the passage of the Tariff Act of 1S28, 
Adams's which will be described in the next chapter. But 

home policy. J^ 

this Act, which was very distasteful to the South, 
only weakened Adams still more. Had he been unscrupulous, 
he might have organized the government service into a strong 
party "machine." But he steadily refused to use the govern- 
ment patronage for his personal advancement. Bearing all 
these facts in mind, it is not strange that Adams was defeated 
in the election of 1828. It is remarkable, however, that he 
received as many electoral votes then as in 1824. 



VII.] J. Q. Adams's Administration. 207 

The campaign of 1828 was fought with a bitterness and 
intemperance only equalled by that of the cam- 
paign of 1800. Jackson's canvass was managed The election 
by Martin Van Buren, of New York, a skilful and 
unscrupulous politician, and by a few of Jackson's personal 
friends. The charges of corruption and fraud were made over 
and over again, and Adams was held up to scorn as a President 
who had not been elected by the people. It was well under- 
stood that Jackson was a man "who stood by his friends," and 
those who worked in his interests felt reasonably sure of some 
reward. Adams's canvass was managed by Clay, and the con- 
test seemed to be a conflict between Jackson and Clay rather 
than between Jackson and Adams. In the end, it was found 
that while Adams received as many votes as he had before, 
the electoral votes which in 1824 had been given to Jackson, 
Crawford, and Clay, were now all given to Jackson, who re- 
ceived one hundred and seventy-eight votes out of a total of 
two hundred and sixty-one. Calhoun was re-elected Vice- 
President by a somewhat smaller vote than that given to 
Jackson. 



CHAPTER VIII. 



DEMOCRACY. 



The election of General Jackson to the presidency was 
the most important event in the history of the 

Importance ^ •' 

of Jackson's United States between the election of Jefferson 
ection. -j^ 1800 and that of Lincoln sixty years later. 

Madison, Monroe, and John Quincy Adams belonged to the 
Jeffersonian school of statesmen who, while holding liberal 
views, yet represented in their education and habits of thought 
the older and more courtly type of statesmen of which Wash- 
ington was the most conspicuous example. Jackson, on the 
contrary, was an indigenous product of the American soil. 
Vigorous, and absolutely without fear, he was a born leader of 
men. The Jeffersonian theory aimed rather at the establ ishment 
of State democracies, while Jackson's mission was the founding 
of a national democracy. The succession of Secretaries of 
State to the chief magistracy was rudely interrupted by the 
elevation of a man of the people to that office. It will be well 
to examine with care the condition of the country at an epoch 
which is so important from a political point of view, and one 
which was also midway between the downfall of federalism and 
the abolition of slavery. 

The total population of the country had increased from a 
little over five and a quarter million souls in 1800 to nearly 
thirteen millions in 1830. The area of the United States 

208 



Chap. VIII.] The United States in 1830. 209 

had increased during the same period from eight hundred and 

fifty thousand to over two million square miles. 

Of the total population, more than two millions Distribution 

■^ J^ ' of population. 

were negro slaves, and about three hundred thou- 
sand were free negroes. The white population, therefore, was 
something over ten and one-half millions. The tendency toward 
town life becomes fairly apparent during this period, owing to 
the increasing importance of manufacturing and commercial 
pursuits. The inhabitants of New York City had increased 
from sixty thousand in 1800 to two hundred and three thousand 
in 1830 — the increase in the lastdecade (1820-30) beingeighty 
thousand. The other large cities were Philadelphia, with one 
hundred and sixty-seven thousand inhabitants, Baltimore with 
eighty thousand, and Boston with sixty-one thousand. New 
Orleans, containing forty-six thousand souls, was the only city 
of any size south of the Potomac and Ohio Rivers. Charleston, 
Savannah, Richmond, and Norfolk had not increased in pro- 
portion to the total populations of the several States in which 
they were situated; while, on the other hand, Cincinnati on 
the northern bank of the Ohio was already a flourishing town 
of twenty-four thousand inhabitants. 

The total population had more than doubled in thirty years, 
but this increase was unevenly distributed. In 
1800, the free inhabitants had been divided be- the po'puiat^on 
tween the North and the South in the propor- 
tion of twenty-five to thirteen. In 1830, regarding Missouri and 
all territory to the southward of 36° 30' N. L. and west of the 
Mississippi as belonging to the South, and preserving to the 
east of that river the old dividing line, it is found that the pro- 
portion of free population in the North to that in the South was 
about the same as in 1800. But the South had maintained 
her position only through the acquisition of Louisiana and the 
Floridas and the rapid settlement of the lands bordering on the 
Gulf of Mexico. The tendency of slavery to limit population 
C. A. 14 



210 Democracy. [Chap. 

can be easily ascertained from a study of ttie figures relating to 
the original thirteen States. In 1800, the free whites in the 
North, omitting now those living west of the Alleghanies, had 
outnumbered those of the South by nearly two to one; in 1830 
they outnumbered them by five to one. The introduction of 
some improvement in transport, or the encouragement of North- 
ern manufactures, or both in combination, might give the free 
North in a few years a population outnumbering the free 
population of the Southern slave States all told, five to one, 
and the fate of slavery would be sealed. The Missouri Com- 
promises postponed the conflict until the introduction of steam 
gave the people of the North an easy means of transport, and 
also imparted a great impulse to manufactures. 

Since 1800 the structure of society had undergone a radical 
„, . change. Virginia, dominant in 1800, was of no 

Changes in ° ° ' ' 

the structure of more importance in 1830 than half-a-dozen other 
socie y. States. The race of statesmen who were at the 

same time philanthropists and philosophers had come to an 
end. It is indeed lamentable that nearly every means employed 
by them for the regeneration of Virginia only hastened its 
decline. Jefferson, by his Act abolishing entails (1776), and 
Madison and Henry by their disestablishment of the Episcopal 
Church (1776-1800), contributed to the destruction of ,the old 
aristocratic framework; and they substituted nothing in its 
place. Had they been able to abolish slavery, the history of 
Virginia would surely have been very different in the years 
following 1830. They were not able to accomplish that, and 
Virginia became the great slave-producing State. The South 
was now led by the representatives of the cotton growers 
of the region south and south-west of Virginia. Their best 
customers, especially after 1811, were the spinners of Western 
England, and thus there came about a trade alliance, so to 
speak, in which the affiliations of 1830 were completely re- 
versed. The South now was friendly to Great Britain, and the 



VIII.] Social Conditions, 1830. 21 1 

people of New England, competing with the British manufact- 
urers, were opposed to their former friends. New England, 
like Virginia, seemed to be on the decline. The sudden 
cessation of war throughout the world, in 1815, brought her 
shipping at once into competition with the shipping of other 
nations, and her factories were closed by an avalanche of 
goods sent over from England and sold for whatever prices 
they would bring. The people emigrated from New England 
in large numbers and settled in the fertile regions of western 
New York and of the new States north-west of the Ohio. 
In other ways a great change had come over New England. 
The religious monopoly hitherto enjoyed by the Congregational 
Church was now fast yielding to the liberal tendencies em- 
bodied in Unitarianism. A speedy revival of thought was the 
result of this breaking down of old barriers. 

The opening of the Erie Canal in 1825 was the beginning of 
a vast system of improved means of communi- 

rn.T • • 1 TT 1 Early canals. 

cation, ihis waterway, connecting the Hudson 
and Lake Ontario, gave the great North-west an outlet to 
the sea. The cost of transporting a ton of grain from the 
Great Lakes to the seaboard at once fell from one hundred 
dollars to ten. The canal paid for itself in a few years, and 
made New York City the great distributing centre of the United 
States. The people went mad on the subject of canals. All 
manner of possible and impossible schemes were at once put 
into execution. The most remarkable of these later canals was 
the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal, designed to connect the tide- 
water with the great interior waterways. John Quincy Adams 
threw the first spadeful of earth, and by his display of physical 
vigour, enjoyed the only moment of popularity during the course 
of his unfortunate administration. These canals were worked 
by horse power, and were most of them failures, for the times 
demanded the employment of a more rapid agent. 

The steam-boat had already taken a prominent place as a 

14 — 2 



2 1 2 Democracy. [Chap. 

means of transport. The monopoly, which Fulton and Living- 
ston sought to establish of the former's inven- 
boafs^. ^ ^*^^'"' tion, had been declared unconstitutional, and 
the building and operating of vessels propelled 
by steam had become free to all. Great advances were made 
in the building and equipping of these boats. Special types 
were designed for lake and river, and the use, the reckless use, 
of the steam-boat became universal. What with canal-boat 
and steam-boat, one could travel through the settled portions 
of the country with only slight and occasional recourse to the 
stage-coach. The steam-boat, however, soon found a rival in 
the steam locomotive. 

The Liverpool and Manchester Railway, opened in 1830, at 

once found imitators in America. In three years' 

Early rail- time, three hundred and eight miles of railroad 

roads. ' ~ 

were in operation in the United States. The most 
notable of the earlier railway enterprises was the Baltimore and 
Ohio. Begun not long after the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal, 
and with the same end in view, the road builders passed the canal 
diggers at Harper's Ferry. The original road was one hundred 
and fifty miles long, and is believed to have been the first single 
railroad of that length to be built. At the outset, these roads 
were designed to connect towns already in existence. After- 
wards the railroad generally was built first, giving the means of 
settlement to a new section of the country, and then transport- 
ing the produce of that region. As a rule these roads were built 
in the flimsiest manner, as rapidly as possible, and afterwards 
improved as fast as financial conditions permitted. In this 
way, the railroad was the most important agent in the settlement 
of the newer States. But it was not until after 1850 that this 
part of its mission was undertaken on a great scale. It is an 
interesting fact that of the thirty railroads first projected only 
three, and those three short lines, were designed to be built 
south of the Potomac. Finally, the use of anthracite coal in 



vni.] The Spoils System. 213 

warming houses, and of illuminating gas for the lighting of 
streets and houses altered in many respects the whole indoors 
life of the urban population of the North. 

The " reign "of " Old Hickory, " as his friends delighted to 
call General Jackson, began with a most indecent „ . . 

•' ° Beginmng of 

mob reception, given at the White House on the the spoils 
night of the inauguration. For weeks and months ^y^*^'"- '^^9- 
thereafter, the executive mansion was thronged by office-seekers. 
"To the victors belong the spoils" was now the watchword. 
Jackson removed office-holders who had not shouted lustily for 
himj but even if a clean sweep had been made, he could not 
have satisfied the demands of his adherents. He did what he 
could, and left as a legacy to the nation a vicious mode of 
using the civil service which has blackened his memory to all 
time. Jackson represented the radical tendencies of the Re- 
publican party, as Adams and Clay stood for its conservative 
tendencies. At first, their adherents were known respectively 
as Jackson-men and Adams-men. Soon, however, names were 
applied which more nearly represented the two shades of 
opinion. The Jackson-men called themselves Democratic 
Republicans, and the Adams-men formed the National Re- 
publican party. Gradually both factions forgot their Repub- 
licanism, the former became the Democrats of a little later 
time, the latter were absorbed into parties with new desig- 
nations. 

The first great political contest of Jackson's administra- 
tion arose on the question of financial policy. 
In 18 16, a moderate protective tariff had been "^"^t^""*!!, 

*- and the tariff. 

passed to help the manufacturers to tide over the 
dull period which followed the close of the war. Protection 
breeds protection. The manufacturers obtaining some aid de- 
manded more, and received it in an amended tariff passed in 
1824. Nothing satisfied their craving for protection, and they 
clamoured for still more. In 1828 a new tariff act was passed 



214 Democracy. [Chap. 

which is known as the "Tariff of Abominations " from the ex- 
orbitant protection it gave to a few branches of manufactures. 
This contest over the tariff produced some astonishing results, 
as unexpected as they were important. In the first place, the 
remnant of the Federalist party disappeared, as the New England 
manufacturers, in order to carry their desires into law, needed 
the votes of the Republicans. In the second place, an alliance 
between the East and the West was entered into, which lessened 
the power of the South in the national councils. This alliance 
was brought about somewhat as follows. The protective tariffs 
produced more revenue than the ordinary needs of the govern- 
ment required; and partly to conceal this fact, it was proposed 
that the national government should undertake many " internal 
improvements " calling for large expenditures. This system, 
under which the revenue derived from taxes imposed for the 
purpose of stimulating home industries, was applied to the 
opening of new lines of internal communication, conferred 
great benefits on the North. The South reaped slight ad- 
vantage from it, and it bore severely upon the South' s best 
customers — the English manufacturers. In 1818 mutterings 
of discontent over the new policy were heard in South Carolina. 
The Southern members of Congress, however, occupied a 
peculiar position in regard to the Tariff of 1828. Many of 
the " abominations " had been inserted in the bill by their votes. 
They had pursued this policy in the hope that the bill might 
be made so outrageous that it could not pass. The Southerners 
were mistaken, and the bill, abominations and all, became law. 
Precisely how much injury, if any, this tariff would have in- 
flicted on South Carolina has never been ascertained. Nor is 
the question an important one. There undoubtedly was a sense 
of grievance, and John C. Calhoun and other South Carolina 
leaders regarded this as a good opportunity to formulate the 
"States-rights" doctrine of "State interposition," even to the 
nullifying, or rendering of no legal effect, Acts of the National 



VIII.] Webster and Hayne. 215 

Congress. This idea was not a new one in any way. It had 
been set forth by Jefferson in 1798 and by the legislators 
of Kentucky in 1799. More recently (1804-15) it had been 
advanced in a somewhat modified form by the New England 
Federalists. It maybe regarded, therefore, at this date, as the 
theory of the weaker party, but it had the approval of both 
of the great parties existing at the time of the organization 
of the government. It was now to be pushed to its logical 
conclusion by the South Carolinians. The first encounter, 
however, between the new forces of nationalism and those 
supporting the revived separatist theories of the Confederation 
epoch, took place on another subject. 

In 1830, Senator Foote of Connecticut introduced a resolu- 
tion of inquiry as to the method of disposal of 
the public lands. The Southerners thought that H^nf*" ^"'^ 
the moment had come when the alliance between 
the West and the East might be destroyed. Calhoun, as Vice- 
President, could not take part in the debate; but Senator 
Hayne, of South Carolina, who frequently acted as Calhoun's 
spokesman, undertook the task. He attacked New England 
with great vehemence, endeavouring to represent that section as 
wishing to check the growth of the West. Daniel Webster, of 
Massachusetts, replied in a speech which shattered every argu- 
ment that had fallen from Hayne. Angered and mortified 
beyond restraint, Hayne returned to the attack. In his second 
speech, he drifted far away from the subject in hand, and laid 
down in a clear and lucid manner the Calhoun theory of 
nullification. In his magnificent rejoinder, Mr Webster set 
forth what may well be called the modern theory of the Consti- 
tution — namely, that it was in no sense a compact, but an 
instrument whereby the "people of the United States " formed 
a strong centralized government, with ample power to enforce 
its rights; that for a State to resist the enforcement of a law 
was revolution if it succeeded, rebellion if it failed. The right 



2l6 Democracy. [Chap. 

of revolution was acknowledged by Mr Webster, and is the 
very root of the American theory of government. But the 
Calhoun doctrine seemed to him to imply that one could 
revolt, and at the same time continue to be a good citizen. 
Mr Webster's argument was historically unsound. When the 
Constitution was made in 1787-89, it was considered in the 
light of a grand political experiment — the State governments, 
on the other hand, were established facts. Nevertheless, 
Webster's argument expressed the true basis of the Constitu- 
tion in 1830, and ever since j for those who stood behind 
Webster in 1830, undoubtedly regarded the central govern- 
ment not merely as an established fact, but as paramount 
to the States. This was due, of course, in great measure, 
to the success which had crowned the federal organization; 
and, it was also due, in part, to the fact that the inhabitants 
of the new States, settled after 1789, never could have the 
same sentiment toward their State as did the people of the 
States which had existed before the formation of the govern- 
ment under the Constitution. Hayne represented the forces 
and ideas of the past, Webster the ideas and tendencies which 
were to be predominant in the future. 

Nothing daunted by this repulse, the Southern leaders 
pressed on, and soon received a blow from an 
Jackson's unexpected quarter. They had regarded Presi- 

dent Jackson as at one with them on questions of 
" States-rights." Jackson believed that the Constitution should 
be strictly construed — except, perhaps, where his own powers 
were concerned. He had no sympathy whatever with sepa- 
ratism. Attending a dinner to commemorate the services of 
Thomas Jefferson, he astonished the company, which was 
assembled in the cause of "States-rights," by proposing as a 
toast : " Our Federal Union : it must be preserved. " At nearly 
the same time, Jackson became aware of Calhoun's statement, 
made in the cabinet in 1816, that he, Jackson, deserved to be 



VIII.] Nullification, 1832-33. 217 

tried by a court martial for his proceedings in Florida. Jackson 
had always supposed that Calhoun had sustained him at that 
time. This, of course, made the shock the more severe. There 
was little mercy for the nullifiers at the hands of the executioner 
of Arbuthnot and Ambristerj there was absolutely nothing 
bright in the political future of John C. Calhoun, so far as it 
depended on Andrew Jackson. 

Recognizing the justness of many of the objections urged 
against the tariff of 1828, Congress passed 
an act in 1832 which substantially re-enacted tion? 1832^-33- 
the much milder tariff of 1824, But this did 
not in any way mollify the South Carolina malcontents. They 
held a State Convention (November, 1832) which declared 
that the Acts of 1828 and 1832 were null and void, and 
prohibited the payment of duties under those laws, after 
February ist, 1833. Jackson was not slow to make reply, nor 
was his meaning difficult to understand. He issued a Procla- 
mation (December nth, 1832), in which he declared that "the 
laws of the United States must be executed. . . . Their [the 
nullifiers'] object is disunion, and disunion by armed force 
is treason." He also asked Congress for increased power to 
enforce the laws. South Carolina met with no favouring 
response from her sister State. Virginia, pretending to act in 
the somewhat extraordinary guise of "mediator" between the 
national government and a State, advised South Carolina to 
suspend the "Nullification Ordinance." The Convention was 
no longer in session, nor was the State legislature, but it was 
evident that Jackson was in earnest. The South Carolina 
leaders, therefore, held an informal meeting, and nullified the 
voice of " the people of South Carolina in Convention assem- 
bled," by suspending the operation of the Nullification Ordi- 
nance (January 31, 1833), before any resistance had been made 
to the federal laws. There is something ludicrous in a con- 
stitutional theory which empowers one party to a compact 



2i8 Democracy. [Chap. 

(supposing the Constitution to have been a compact) to over- 
rule the wishes of the other twenty — -or, supposing the theory 
to be still (1894) tenable, of the other forty-three partners in 
the agreement. There is something ridiculous in a coterie of 
politicians presuming to overrule the will of the people, and to 
settle the fate of a nation or nations at an irregular meeting. 
The election of 1832 had been held in November of that 
, , year. Tackson had been re-elected President by 

Jackson re- j j j 

elected Pres- two hundred and nineteen. votes out of a total 
ident, 1832. ^^^g ^j ^^^ hundred and eighty-eight. South 

Carolina was the only Southern State which had voted solidly 
against him, although a majority of the electoral votes of Mary- 
land were given for Clay. That statesman — the candidate of 
the National Republicans — received forty-nine votes. Cal- 
houn had lost his place in Jackson's regard, and in the affections 
of the party, and Van Buren became the Democratic candidate 
for the vice-presidency. He was elected and presided over 
the deliberations of the Senate, which had recently refused to 
confirm him as Minister to England. The election of 1832 
is memorable, as being the first time that party conven- 
tions were held to nominate a candidate for the presidency. 
It was also at this time that resolutions embodying the prin- 
ciples of a party were first drawn up and issued as the 
"platform" on which a party candidate was supposed to 
stand. These changes were inaugurated by a new party — the 
first political organization to base its claims to power on the 
ground of a single idea. This was the anti-Masonic party, 
which originated in a movement in New York against the Free- 
masons. The charge that a former Freemason had been mur- 
dered because he had revealed the secrets of the Order was 
never met by that body to the satisfaction of the public, and was 
the ostensible ground for the party's existence. In reality, 
the anti-Masonic movement was the result of a feeling of 
unrest and dissatisfaction with the existing organizations. In 



VIII.] Tlie Compromise Tariff of 1833. 219 

this party were several young men destined to play prominent 
parts in national politics, among them William H. Seward. 

Jackson seemed to feel that his triumphant re-election was 
in the nature of a mandate from the people to 
proceed against the United States Bank, and to J^}l?^^^'^. °^ 

'^ ° , . Nullification. 

coerce South Carolina. The latter business was 
as a matter of fact compromised. Two bills were passed in 
succession: one, the Force Bill (March 2, 1833), gave Jackson 
the powers he needed to enforce the laws; the other, which 
passed the next day, was the panacea which Clay thought best 
suited to preserve the Union. It was a compromise tariff, 
providing for a gradual reduction of duties, during a period of 
ten years, to the general level of the tariff of 18 16. The Nulli- 
fying Convention of South Carolina met again (March 11, 1833), 
and formally repealed the Nullification Ordinance, and passed 
another, nullifying the Force Bill. It has long been a question 
as to which party came out of this struggle victorious. On the 
one hand. South Carolina procured the repeal of the tariff acts 
of which she complained. On the other hand, no actual resist- 
ance was ever offered to the United States; no law was actually 
nullified, and nullification never became embodied in the con- 
stitutional practice of the country. Some writers think that if 
there had been no compromise, the Calhoun school of theorists 
would have been taught a lesson by Jackson, which would have 
prevented the Civil War. Others assert that South Carolina 
was really beaten in 1832-33, and to justify themselves, point 
to the fact that the tariff of 1842 was not nullified. But these 
are speculations with which the historical student really has 
nothing to do. In the matter of the Bank, at all events, there 
was no compromise. 

The Charter of the Second Bank of the United States 
was to expire in 1836. At one time its affairs 
had fallen into confusion, but in 1830, and for Removal of 

' ^ ' the deposits. 

some years previously, it was well managed under 



220 Democracy. [Chap. 

the direction of Nicholas Biddle, its President. Besides this 
great national bank with its numerous branches, there were 
innumerable State banks chartered by the State legislatures. 
Many of these State banks were political institutions, managed 
in the interests of this or that political clique. The odium 
aroused by the mismanagement of these banks reacted upon the 
United States Bank. Undoubtedly Jackson was sincere in his 
belief that the latter was a great political machine, and for this 
conclusion there seems to have been some reason. The cause 
of the Bank was championed by Jackson's rival, Henry Clay, 
who showed as poor judgment in this case as he had shown years 
before, when he accepted a seat in Adams's cabinet. In 1831, 
five years before the charter would expire, he forced an issue 
upon the granting of a new charter. Both Houses of Congress 
passed a bill for this purpose which was vetoed by Jackson, 
and Clay's majority in Congress was not sufficient to pass it 
over the President's veto. The election of 1832 had been 
fought partly on this issue, and Jackson felt that the voters 
approved the policy embodied in his veto. There can be no 
doubt that the Bank had taken part in this campaign, nor can 
there be any dispute that the power exercised by the President 
of the Bank was dangerous to the country, or, at least, easily 
might become so. It was solvent, however, and unless some- 
thing should occur out of the ordinary course, it was likely to 
continue solvent. Nevertheless, Jackson determined to cease 
depositing the public funds in the Bank and to draw out gradu- 
ally, in the ordinary course of business, the funds already on 
deposit, amounting to some nine million dollars. Under the 
Act incorporating the Bank the power to do this belonged to 
the Secretary of the Treasury and not to the President. Jackson 
experienced some difficulty before he found a Secretary to do 
his bidding. Indeed he drove two Secretaries from office before 
a third appointee, Roger B. Taney, of Maryland, proved willing 
to take the responsibility. The so-called "removal of the de- 



VIII.] yackson and the Bmik. 221 

posits " extended over a period of six months, and was 
therefore not so harsh a measure as the phrase would seem to 
imply. In the Senate, where the opponents of Jackson were 
in a majority, this action was denounced with great vehemence 
by Clay and Webster. The Senators even went so far as to 
pass a vote of censure on the President. This drew from 
Jackson a most caustic protest, in which he laid down the theory 
of the absolute independence of the three great departments of 
the government. A few years later, the vote of censure was ex- 
punged from the Journal of the Senate. The public funds were 
then deposited in certain specified State banks — popularly 
known as the "pet banks." The efforts of the Bank of the 
United States to protect its credit, and to meet the drafts of 
the government, necessitated the calling in of loans; and a 
dangerous scarcity of money occurred before affairs settled 
themselves on the new basis. At the expiration of its charter, 
the Bank secured a charter from the Pennsylvania legislature, 
and continued in existence as a State bank. 

Jackson's foreign policy was as vigorous as his action in 
domestic affairs, and as triumphant as Adams's 
had been unsuccessful. Van Buren, the Secretary foreign poUcv 
of State, veiled the iron hand of his master in the 
velvet glove of an astute politician. The dispute with England, 
which Jackson had inherited from his predecessor, was easily 
settled. Canning died in 1829, and, in the Ministry which 
succeeded his short administration. Lord Aberdeen, ever con- 
ciliatory, took the foreign portfolio. Congress passed an Act 
enabling the President to declare void certain laws, which bore 
heavily on British commerce, whenever Great Britain should 
withdraw her restrictions. Negotiation was thus made easy, and 
the matter was soon settled in a way satisfactory to the United 
States. With France, Jackson had more trouble. For years, 
successive governments had endeavoured to induce France 
to pay for Napoleon's unjustifiable spoliations of American 



222 Democracy. [Chap. 

commerce since 1803. In 1830, the Revolution of July placed 
Louis Philippe and Lafayette at the head of affairs. A treaty 
was signed the next year by which the French government agreed 
to pay five million dollars in settlement of these claims. It proved 
to be a very difficult matter to secure the payment of the money, 
and at one time it seemed as if war was imminent between the 
two countries. In a game of bluster Jackson had no superior, 
and he had also the capacity to strike hard, which one does not 
ordinarily associate with bluster. France finally paid the money 
in 1835. Jackson furthermore secured the settlement of long- 
standing disputes with Denmark and with Spain, while nations 
like Austria, which up to this time had held aloof, seemed to 
recognize in "Old Hickory" and the people at his back, a 
nation with whom it would be well to be on friendly terms. 
In other financial concerns besides the Bank, Jackson 
enjoyed great present success, although he be- 
poiicy^.""^ queathed a heavy burden to his successor. On 

January ist, 1835, the last instalment of the 
National Debt was paid, and the American people, alone of 
modern nations, stood wondering at the thought of having neither 
principal nor interest to pay. In point of fact, the matter was 
exceedingly embarrassing; for the Compromise Tariff Act of 
1833 prevented the reduction of duties, except in the manner 
therein specified. The government was collecting much more 
money than it could spend on current expenses, and it was 
difficult to find a constitutional means of escape. The govern- 
ment could not hoard the money as it does now-a-days, because 
the independent treasury system had not then been devised; 
and no one advocated depositing larger balances with the "pet 
banks." The surplus might have been used to make internal 
improvements had not taxation, for such a purpose, been against 
one of the cardinal maxims of Democratic constitutional inter- 
pretation. Finally, it was decided to loan the surplus above 
five millions to the States in proportion to their representation 



VIII.] Jacksoiis Specie Circular, 1836. 223 

in Congress. The money was to be "deposited," but no one 
expected it ever would be demanded of the States, and this 
phrase was selected to avoid the constitutional objection that 
Congress had no power to raise money by taxation to pay over 
to the States. Three quarterly payments were made under this 
act in 1837, and then the government found itself obliged not 
merely to cease "depositing" money with the States, but to 
borrow money itself to pay current expenses. 

The apparent success of Jackson's financial policy led to 
disaster. The "pet bank" scheme resulted in 
the formation of a vast number of banks eager circuiar^^is'a^e. 
to share in the spoil; and the overthrow of the 
United States Bank, as a great controlling financial insti- 
tution, removed the only conservative force which could have 
restrained speculation. A period of " wild-cat banking " set in. 
"Rag-money" was poured out by these institutions as fast as 
the presses could supply it. The currency became disreputable. 
Jackson, acting on his own responsibility in this instance, as in 
the case of the Bank, issued a "Specie Circular" in 1836, di- 
recting that nothing save gold, silver, and notes of specie-paying 
banks should be received in payment for the public lands. 
This affected especially the banks in the more recently settled 
portions of the country, but it greatly helped to overturn the 
credit system everywhere. Money suddenly became very dear, 
loaning rates being as high as twenty-four per cent. The price 
of the necessaries of life also increased enormously. Every 
one, however, went on with his speculations, and Jackson left 
office in March, 1837, before the crash, proclaiming his belief 
in the efficacy of his "Specie Circular" to set all things right. 

Jackson's successor as President was Martin Van Buren, 
formerly his Secretary of State and more recently 
Vice-President. VanBuren had risen to political elected Pres- 
power by the employment of methods similar to ' ^"'^' ^ ^ ' 
those which had given Burr his political strength. He was 



224 Democracy. [Chap. 

regarded by his contemporaries as a self-seeking office monger, 
and was held responsible for most of the evil acts of Jackson. 
There was some reason for this belief, as Van Buren, in order 
to win the Democratic nomination, had accepted responsibility 
for Jackson's acts in promising to carry on his policy. It seems 
probable, however, that Van Buren had not regarded the politi- 
cal proscription of the early years of Jackson's administration 
as justifiable, and had done something to mitigate its severity. 
But he was obliged to bear the blame for the financial collapse 
of 1837, and for the rascality which then came to light on the 
part of many of Jackson's appointees. 

The panic of 1837 had no counterpart in the annals of the 
T-u <. o u United States up to that time. The State banks 

1 he ouD- ^ 

treasury" failed, among them the "pet banks, "which held 

erne. public funds to the amount of some nine million 

dollars at the time of their bankruptcy. The United States 
issued treasury notes to tide over the crisis; but what could be 
done with the moneys received by the government? Van Buren, 
himself, seems to have conceived the plan of an independent 
government treasury, apart from the financial institutions of the 
country. Three times the plan was voted down in Congress, 
but in 1840 it was passed in an amended form. This act pro- 
vided for the construction of vaults at Washington and at other 
important points in the country. At these places the public 
funds should be received, held, and paid out on the proper au- 
thority. From this latter feature of the plan, it is generally known 
as the sub-treasury scheme. This was the only important act of 
Van Buren' s administration. His firmness and constancy on this 
and other points of financial and administrative reform made 
him unpopular. The Democratic party was regarded as re- 
sponsible for the panic, and was discredited by the corruption 
discovered in many branches of the government service. A new 
party had meantime come into existence calling itself Whig, to 
distinguish its reforming tendencies from what was regarded as 



VIII.] The Campaigri of 1840. 225 

the Toryism of the Democrats. All the factions opposed to the 
Democrats gathered under the new standard. Of this party, 
Clay was the ablest man, but he was at this time unpopular, and 
a Whig convention nominated William Henry Harrison, the 
"victor at Tippecanoe," for President, on no platform except 
that of opposition to Democratic Van Burenism. For Vice- 
President, they nominated Tyler of Virginia — a lifelong Demo- 
crat — in the expectation that he would attract Democratic 
votes. "Tippecanoe and Tyler too" proved to be a popular 
battle-cry. With ill-timed spite, a Democratic leader asserted 
that if Harrison were given a log cabin and a barrel of cider he 
would sit down in contentment and cease to trouble the Demo- 
crats. The gibe was at once assumed as a mark of honour, 
and Harrison became the log-cabin, cider-drinking candidate. 
On the other side it was asserted that Van Buren sat in stuffed 
chairs and ate out of gold spoons - — in short, that he was an aris- 
tocrat. The campaign was fought on these lines. Log cabins 
were erected everywhere, and were carried on wheels by long 
processions of men shouting lustily for "Tippecanoe." There 
has been nothing like the campaign of 1840, before or since. 
Harrison was elected by two hundred and thirty-four electoral 
votes to only sixty given to Van Buren. 

General Harrison was a sincere honest man of sixty-nine. 
He seems to have felt himself to be an exponent 
of real democracy against the aristocracy which j^^^^*'^ °^ 
had masqueraded under that name during Van 
Buren's tenure of office. He therefore placed himself at the dis- 
posal of all who wished to see him. His supporters thronged to 
Washington in search of ofifices, some of them even sleeping in 
out-of-the-way corners of the White House, that they might be 
the first to greet the General in the morning, and thus better 
their chances for a place. The constant pressure bore heavily 
on the old man. He caught cold and died on April 4th, 1841, 
just one month after his inauguration to his high office. For the 
C.A. 15 



226 Democracy. [Chap. 

first time in the history of the country, a Vice-President, John 
Tyler, of Virginia, became President, by reason of the death of 
his chief. 

Tyler's sympathies were with the Democrats rather than 

with the WhigS;, and it soon became apparent 

Tyler's Ad- ^j^^^^ j^g ^jj^ j^q|- j^tend to be domineered over by 

ministration. -' 

Clay and the other leaders of the party. Congress 
met in May, and Clay produced an elaborate plan of legislation. 
The first bill to pass the two houses was one to repeal the 
Independent Treasury Act of 1840. To this Tyler assented. 
But when the proposal to establish a new National Bank 
came up, he was firm in his refusal to permit any legislation 
of the kind. He vetoed two acts in succession — the latter of 
which was drawn up to meet suggestions of his own. The 
Whig leaders were furious, and read him out of the party. 
The Democrats would not act harmoniously with him, and the 
singular spectacle was presented of a President without a party, 
and a successful party unable to carry its policy into effect. 
Two other measures in Clay's programme were carried through 
Congress and assented to by the President. One of these pro- 
vided for the payment to the States of the proceeds of the sales 
of public lands, but it was made nugatory by the addition 
that this should take place only when the tariff on imports 
should fall below twenty per cent, ad valore^n, which it never 
did. The other measure was the Tariff Act of 1842, which 
considerably increased the duties as finally levied under the 
Compromise Tariff of 1833. 

Harrison had gathered about him an able set of cabinet 
„, . , advisers, of whom Daniel Webster, Secretary of 

The Ash- ' ' •' 

burton Treaty, State, was the most prominent. They were at 
^ '''^' first retained by Tyler, but they all resigned save 

Webster at the time of the Bank veto. Webster alone remained 
to conclude important negotiations with Great Britain. The 
negotiatois of the Treaty of 1783 had unwittingly agreed to a 



VIII.] The Ashburton Treaty, 1842. 227 

boundary between the United States and the British Provinces 
on the north-east, which proved to be nearly impossible to 
determine on the ground. Each mile of it might almost be 
said to bristle with difficulties. After many fruitless attempts 
to settle the matter by direct negotiations, the two governments 
referred the dispute to the King of the Netherlands as arbiter. 
He decided (1829) in favour of neither party, but proposed a 
compromise' — which he had no authority to do. Mr Webster 
and Lord Ashburton, the head of the Baring family, and now 
British Minister at Washington, agreed to a compromise. The 
United States gave way somewhat as to the boundary line of 
the State of Maine, and received an important strip in northern 
New York, containing Rouse's Point, which had been fortified 
by the Americans before an accurate survey had disclosed the 
fact that it was in reality north of the northern boundary of 
New York, and therefore in Canada. At the same time, extra- 
dition of specified classes of criminals was provided for, and a 
long series of negotiations looking toward the suppression of 
the African slave-trade was brought to a satisfactory conclusion. 
The point at issue in this case was the exercise by British naval 
officers of the right to search vessels flying the American flag in 
order to discover if they were slavers. Upon the question of 
right of search, the American public was very sensitive. The 
issue was now evaded by the conclusion of the " cruising con- 
vention," which obliged each nation to keep a squadron of a 
certain strength always cruising on the slave coast. Mr Webster 
having accomplished this, followed his colleagues out of office. 
The treaty was not well received in England by all parties. 
Some persons even called it the "Ashburton capitulation," in 
token of their dislike. It appears, however, that had Webster 
been correctly informed he need not have yielded as much as 
he did as to the north-eastern boundary of Maine. 

The interest of American politics from this time onwards 
turns more and more on the constitutional struggle against the 

15—2 



228 De7nocracy. [Chap. 

extension of slavery and against the theory of secession. The 
Be innin Missouri Compromise (1820) had established a 

of the struggle feeling in the country that the compromise line 
avery. would Separate for ever the territory devoted to 
freedom from that given over to slavery. The breaking of the 
compromise by the addition of a strip of western land to Mis- 
souri, in 1836, had not disturbed this feeling of confidence. 
Nor did the fact that several of the eastern slave-States were 
north of the compromise line suggest that one day an effort 
might be made to increase the size of the region consigned to 
the slave-owners. Yet some attempt at the extension of that 
territory was inevitable. The surest and easiest way would 
have been to absorb new lands to the south-west, and perhaps 
also to add Cuba and other West India Islands to the United 
States. This extension of slave territory was necessary to the 
slave-power, as it was apparent that the control of all the 
branches of the national government might at any time belong 
to the people of the free States of the North, unless new do- 
mains were opened to slavery. Representation in the popular 
branch of the national legislature was based upon popula- 
tion — slaves being estimated at only three-fifths of their 
actual number, and Presidential electors were apportioned 
according to the same ratio, with two additional electors for 
each State. The Senate offered the only security to the slave- 
power, for there each State had two votes. Only by increasing 
slave territory or by adding to the number of slave-States, could 
the South hope to retain control of even one branch of Congress 
and thus to prevent legislation hostile to slavery. The Census of 
1840 showed clearly that the South was falling behind in the in- 
crease of population. This was due to the fact that slave labour 
was suitable only to agriculture and also tended to keep out the 
free immigrants from Europe, who, almost without exception, 
either remained in the manufacturing and commercial centres 
of the North, or settled in the agricultural regions of the West, 



VIII.] Annexation of Texas. 229 

Southern statesmen, therefore, cast about them for new territory 
to annex to the United States that would be suitable to slavery. 
In this way their attention was directed to Texas. 

In 182 1 Mexico had revolted from Spain and formed a 
federative republic. Later Texas, the most 
north-eastern province and the one nearest the of x"exal^ '°" 
United States, revolted in turn from Mexico. 
The settlers of that province were largely from the United 
States. Led by Samuel Houston, of Tennessee — a friend 
of Jackson's — they defeated the Mexicans under Santa Anna, 
on the San Jacinto, and organized the Republic of Texas 
(1836). The independence of the new nation was recognized 
by the United States and by some other powers in 1837. 
Texas almost immediately sought admission to the American 
Union, But the attempt to bring this about was certain to 
arouse dangerous contentions, and Jackson and Van Buren 
had declined the earlier overtures. Tyler, himself a slave- 
owner, viewed the matter more favourably, and negotiations 
ripened into a treaty of annexation, which was submitted to 
the Senate for ratification in 1844. It failed to secure the 
necessary votes, and was rejected. This was partly due to 
the clandestine manner in which the treaty had been made. 
The controversy proved to be the leading issue in the Presi- 
dential campaign of that year (1844). Many persons preferred 
to use the word re-annexation in place of annexation — imply- 
ing thereby that the United States in absorbing Texas would 
be only taking territory to which she was justly entitled. 

The Whig candidate for President in 1844 was Henry Clay, 
a slave-owner from Kentucky. He seemed to 
have two minds on the question of admitting jg^'^*^''"" °^ 
Texas, writing letters of approval and dis- 
approval, as if trying to compromise with himself on the 
matter. The Democratic candidate was James K. Polk, of 
Tennessee, who had been Speaker of the National House of 



230 Democr-acy. [Chap. 

Representatives. He owned slaves and was outspoken in his 
desire for the admission of Texas. Tyler had intrigued for a 
re-nomination, but, conscious that he had no chance of being 
elected, he withdrew and Polk was nominated. Meantime a 
party, advocating the abolition of slavery, had sprung up in 
the North, It was known as the Liberty party, and held the 
balance of power. Had the voters of this party supported 
Clay, he would have been elected. But they distrusted him 
and nominated a candidate of their own. They seem to 
have preferred a slave-owner who knew his own mind to one 
who did not, and by throwing away their votes on a third 
candidate assured the election of Polk. A joint resolution 
now passed both Houses of Congress, providing for the re- 
annexation of Texas, and extending the line of the Missouri 
Compromise through the new territory to be acquired. Three 
days before the expiration of his term of office, Tyler signed 
this law, and at once took the necessary steps to carry the plan 
into execution. It was not until the middle of April, however, 
that the final arrangements were made, and Polk was then 
President. 

A question immediately arose as to the true western 

boundary of Texas. Was Texas to be confined 
v^'r! Xe-ls^" within the area assigned to her as one of the 

States of the Mexican Republic, or was her true 
western limit the Rio Grande, the limit of the old French and 
Spanish district denominated Texas? The State of Texas and 
the United States contended that the Rio Grande was the true 
frontier, and this, as a matter of fact, was the limit of Texas 
when sold by Spain in 1800, and by France three years later. 
President Polk ordered General Zachary Taylor, commander of 
the United States army in the South-west, to advance to the 
Rio Grande, adding that if the Mexicans should attack him 
there, he should at once cross the river into Mexico. Taylor 
advanced, the Mexicans ordered him to return, and these 



VIII.] The Mexican War, 1846-48. 231 

orders not being complied with they attacked and, after some 
blood had been shed, captured a small detachment of the 
American army (April 23rd, 1846), This enabled the Presi- 
dent to assert that "War existed by the act of Mexico," and 
Congress accepted the issue thus raised. The Mexican War 
which followed was in reality an attack on a weak nation by a 
strong one. The American armies in the field, however, were 
nearly always greatly outnumbered by their opponents, who 
also enjoyed all ths advantages of fighting on the defensive. 
The American soldiers, consequently, won renown by the 
splendid fighting qualities they displayed, and the chief com- 
manders acquired great military reputations. There were two 
lines of operations, one being a continuation of Taylor's for- 
ward movement. With this campaign are associated the names 
of the victories of Palo Alto, Resaca de las Palmas, and Buena 
Vista (February, 1847). These victories made General Taylor 
a successful candidate for the Presidency; they did not con- 
vince the Mexicans, however, that the claim of the United 
States to their Northern provinces must be allowed. That 
conviction could only be forced upon them by the capture of 
their capital, the City of Mexico. This task was intrusted to 
General Winfield Scott — the senior officer of the army, and 
one of the few men who had won an enduring reputation in 
the War of 181 2. Landing on the Mexican coast (March, 
1847), near Vera Cruz, he captured that seaport and then 
began a long march to the interior, following, in general, in the 
footsteps of the Spanish Conquistadores of the early part of the 
sixteenth century. He swept aside a Mexican force which 
tried to check his advance at Cerro Cordo, and passing by the 
mighty peaks of Orizaba and Popocataped, entered the valley 
of Mexico. The splendid victories of Contreras, Churubusco, 
Molino del Rey, and Chapultepec (September, 1847) placed 
the City of Mexico within his power. On February 2nd, 1848, 
a treaty was signed at Guadalupe Hidalgo, which, with unim- 



232 Democracy. [Chap. 

portant changes, was ratified by the Senate of the United States 
and by Mexico. By this treaty, the United States acquired a 
clear title to Texas as far as the Rio Grande, to New Mexico, 
and to California — which had been seized by American mili- 
tary and naval forces. For these great acquisitions the United 
States gave Mexico (i) peace, (2) fifteen million dollars, and 
(3) a promise to pay some three million dollars more to 
American citizens who held claims on the Mexican govern- 
ment. Later, in 1853, the United States purchased from 
Mexico a strip of land between the Rio Grande and the 
Colorado River. These acquisitions, including Texas, added 
about eight hundred and seventy-five thousand square miles 
of land to the area of the United States. During Polk's ad- 
ministration, also, the frontier of the United States in the 
North-west was settled substantially as it exists to-day. 

The region west of the crest of the Rocky Mountains and 

north of the forty-second parallel was called 
Treaty 1846." Oregon. The northern limit of this region was 

vague and its ownership unsettled. The title 
of the United States to Oregon was shrouded in such obscurity 
as only diplomatists care to penetrate. It was composed of 
many elements: (i) the discovery of the Columbia River by 
an American citizen, (2) the assignment of whatever rights 
Spain still had by the Florida Treaty of 18 19, (3) contiguity to 
Louisiana, (4) exploration and occupation resulting from the 
ownership of Louisiana. It was not contended that any one 
of these elements constituted a valid title, but it was argued 
that taken together they formed a better title than could be 
advanced by any other nation. The only other power which 
pushed its claims to this region was Great Britain. The 
governments of these two countries could not agree as to 
partition, and they determined to occupy the region in common 
as long as the joint occupation seemed to be advantageous to 
both nations. This condition of affairs continued from 1818 



VIII.] TJie Oregon Treaty, 1846. 233 

to 1845. During the earlier years of this period, the British 
fur- trading companies preponderated in Oregon. Later on, 
American colonists, with their families, had passed the moun- 
tains and settled in the fertile river valleys. As in the original 
settlement of the country, the English settlers had driven out 
the French trappers, so in Oregon the American emigrant 
farmers drove away the Canadian and English fur-traders. The 
boundary between Canada and the United States from the 
Lake of the Woods to the Rocky Mountains was the forty- 
ninth parallel. The United States, for some years, had been 
willing to extend that line to the Pacific, thus yielding to Great 
Britain the territory between forty-nine and fifty-four degrees 
and forty minutes of north latitude — the latter line being 
the recognized southern boundary of the Russian province 
of Alaska. The adoption of the forty-ninth parallel as the 
boundary between American and British territory, besides 
giving to the United States the mouth and the greater part of 
the basin of the Columbia River, would also give it the 
southern end of Vancouver's Island, and the control of the 
southern channel connecting the sounds between that island 
and the continent with the ocean. To this Great Britain 
would not consent, and the Americans reverted to their 
more extensive claims. In 1845, the war spirit ran high in 
the United States. "All Oregon, or none," and "Fifty-four 
forty or fight" became the cry. For a while it seemed as if 
the United States would be obliged to wage war with Great 
Britain and Mexico at the same time. Joint occupation of 
Oregon was terminated by the act of the United States. More 
peaceful counsels prevailed, however, and it was arranged by 
treaty, in 1846, that the boundary between the United States 
and Canada should be the forty-ninth parallel, as far as the 
channel separating Vancouver's Island from the mainland, and 
should then follow the middle of that channel to the Pacific 
Ocean. There was some dispute as to which channel was the 



234 Democracy. [Chap. viii. 

one meant by the negotiators of the treaty of 1846, but this 
contention was arranged by arbitration in 1871 — the German 
Emperor acting as arbitrator and deciding in favour of the 
United States. The more difificult question as to the division 
of these great acquisitions between slavery and freedom re- 
mained to be settled. 



CHAPTER IX. 

THE EXTENSION OF SLAVERY, 1849-6I. 

The Missouri compromises settled the question of slavery 
extension for many years, and at the same time 
made the division between the slave and free slavery agita- 
sections more permanent. But the issue in- *°"' 
volved in that contest had hardly been set at rest when other 
questions turning on slavery arose. The people of the 
North, for the most part, were busily employed in acquiring 
wealth. The northern merchants and manufacturers agreed 
with the southern slave-owners in a desire to leave the whole 
subject of slavery undiscussed and undisturbed. There are to 
be found, however, from time to time, in all parts of the world, 
earnest souls whose consciences will not permit them to blink 
at what seems to be wrong, no matter how their material 
interests may be affected by their actions. Such an one was 
William Lloyd Garrison. In 183 1, while nullification was 
threatening to disturb the peace of the country, he began at 
Boston the publication of a paper devoted to the abolition 
of negro slavery and called "The Liberator." The South 
Carolina politician was satisfied with nullification — as a first 
step at least; the Massachusetts agitator clamoured for no 
union with slave-owners, and denounced the Constitution as 
" an agreement with Hell." In the same year that Garrison 

235 



236 TJie Extension of Slavery. [Chap. 

began the publication of "The Liberator," a slave insurrection 
broke out in Virginia under the leadership of Nat Turner. 
There was no connection between the two events, but the 
Southerners became wild with excitement. The legislature 
of Georgia offered a reward of five thousand dollars for 
Garrison's arrest and conviction, and not a copy of "The 
Liberator" could be openly sold south of the Potomac. In- 
citement to murder in the South had its counterpart in mob 
violence in the North. Garrison was locked up in the Boston 
jail to protect him from the rioters, and William Ellery Chan- 
ning, publishing a tract against slavery, was deserted by the 
greater part of his congregation. The matter soon became 
an affair of national importance owing to the lack of wisdom 
displayed by the Southern leaders in trying to prevent the 
presentation of anti-slavery petitions to Congress. John 
Quincy Adams, the ex-President, was now a member of the 
House of Representatives. He led the battle for freedom on 
this issue of the right of petition, and gained for himself a 
place in the history of the United States as honourable as it 
is unique. The murder of an abolitionist newspaper editor, 
named Lovejoy, brought to public notice one of the most 
splendid orators of all time, Wendell Phillips. At a meet- 
ing held in Faneuil Hall, Boston, he rebuked "the recreant 
American," who in the interest of the slave-holders had 
"slandered the dead." The abolition movement seemed to 
be losing strength, however, when the acquisition of Texas, 
New Mexico, California, and Oregon brought the nation once 
again face to face with the problem of the extension of slavery. 
Once again, under the lead of Henry Clay, the nation flinched 
and strove to avoid the issue by compromise. 

Oregon was situated so far north that all parties seem to 

have agreed to extend to that territory the prin- 

Settiement ciples of the Ordinance of 1787 as to slavery. 

of California. ^ i i j 

With regard to California, the case was different. 



IX.] The Settlement of California, 1848-49. 237 

That territory extended far to the south of the line of the Mis- 
souri Compromise. Before the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo 
had been concluded, a workman on Colonel Suter's mill-race, 
near the site of the present city of Sacramento, noticed a few 
bits of gold in the earth taken from the trench. Slight explora- 
tion confirmed the discovery, and a small package containing 
the precious metal was sent to Washington and there placed on 
exhibition. Then followed a movement such as the world had 
never witnessed before in historic times. Over land and over 
water, the gold-seekers thronged to California. A majority 
of these early pioneers, " the forty-niners," were Northern men 
and themselves laboured for the gold. Between February, 1848, 
and November, 1849, niore than eighty thousand emigrants 
entered the country. In the latter month they held a con- 
vention, drew up a State constitution prohibiting slavery, and 
applied to Congress for admission to the Union as a free State. 
Congress thus was forced to come to some decision as to the 
disposal of the territory acquired from Mexico. 

General Taylor was now (1849-50) President, having been 
elected by the Whig party in November, 1848. The"wi 
He was a Louisiana sugar planter and the owner mot Proviso," 
of a hundred slaves, and was the father-in-law ' '*^' 
of Jefferson Davis, one of the Senators from Mississippi. 
President Taylor, at the time of his inauguration, seems to 
have believed the Northern anti-slavery men to have been 
the aggressors. He soon discovered that the aggression was 
on the other side. Moreover, he fell under the influence of 
William H. Seward of New York, one of the anti-slavery 
leaders in the Senate. Taylor determined to hurry California 
and New Mexico into the Union as free or slave States, as the 
people of each region might determine. When Congress 
met, however, Clay worked out a plan for a compromise 
which would settle all the pending questions which in any 
way involved slavery, in the interests of conciliation and good 



238 The Extension of Slavery. [Chap. 

feeling. The precise motives which actuated Clay at this 
time have been much debated. Some writers have asserted 
that a jealousy of Taylor, his successful rival, was the leading 
motive, and others have suggested that he really believed that 
secession on the part of the slave States was imminent. The 
accuracy of the insight of those who believed that the Union 
was really in danger in 1850 has however been impugned. 
No matter what was the cause of Clay's action, it is certain 
that the discussions which it aroused greatly increased what- 
ever bitterness of feeling there may have been. This contest 
had been somewhat forestalled by the attempt of the anti- 
slavery men to devote these new territories to freedom before 
they were acquired. This they endeavoured to accomplish 
{1846) by attaching to the bill appropriating money to enable 
the President to buy land from Mexico, a proviso that slavery 
should be forbidden for ever in any territory acquired from 
Mexico. This was known as the VVilmot Proviso because it 
was introduced by David Wilmot of Pennsylvania. The bill 
was defeated at the moment owing, curiously enough, to the 
fact that the clocks of the two Houses did not agree, so that 
the Senate did not take action until after the House had 
finally adjourned; the bill thus failed to pass at that session. 
The appropriation was made a short time afterwards, without 
the proviso. The extremists in the North were determined 
that sooner or later the policy embodied in the Wilmot Proviso 
should become the law of the land. The Southern extremists 
were determined to break up the Union, if it were passed 
into law. General Taylor, with rare insight, recognized that 
the easiest way would be that the people of the proposed 
States should settle the matter before the politicians could 
meddle with it. Clay, however, took possession of the subject 
and proceeded to dispose of the whole matter in his own 
way. 

Clay's compromise scheme included the simultaneous 



IX.] The Compromise of 1850. 239 

settlement of eight questions in the following manner : (i) Cali- 
fornia to be admitted as a free State; (2) New „, , ^ 

' ^ / Clay s Corn- 

Mexico and Utah to be organized as territories, promise 

without any reference being made as to slavery; ^ ^™^" 
(3) and (4) the claims of Texas to portions of New Mexico to 
be extinguished by a money payment by the United States 
to Texas; (5) slavery not to be abolished in the District of 
Columbia; (6) the slave-trade to be prohibited within that 
district; (7) an affirmation to the effect that Congress has no 
power over the inter-state slave-trade; and (8) the passage of a 
workable fugitive slave law. In the course of the debates to 
which these resolutions gave rise, four speeches were made 
which well show the different phases of public opinion at the 
moment. The first was delivered by Clay, "compromise in- 
carnate," as he has been well termed by a modern writer. He 
was now an old man and a thrice disappointed candidate for 
the presidency. He was one of those slave-owners, of whom 
Senator Benton of Missouri was the best example, who preferred 
their country to their slaves. Of Clay's patriotism and sin- 
cerity there is not the slightest doubt, though the expediency of 
some of his actions may be open to question. He now could 
see no safety for the country except in "a union of hearts" to 
be brought about by mutual concessions. The issue, he ar- 
gued, was one of sentiment on the part of the Northerners — of 
interest on the part of the Southerners. Sentiment he thought 
could be more easily overcome than interest, and, therefore, the 
Northerners, in the general bargain, must concede more than 
their opponents. This was the view of a Southern moderate. 
John C. Calhoun represented the Southern extremists. He wai 
now at death's door, and died in fact within a few weeks of his 
speech. He was too weak to read aloud what he had written, 
and it was read to the Senate by another Southern Senator. 
Calhoun put forward no plan. The Union was doomed unless 
the South should have equal rights in the newly acquired 



240 The Extension of Slavery. [Chap. 

districts. He had no desire for local option, and regarded 
the action of the Californians as a piece of gross impertinence 
— the admission of that State would be equivalent to a notice 
that the North meant to overwhelm the South. He also 
demanded the passage of a fugitive slave law which would 
give the slave-owners power to exercise their constitutional 
right to reclaim their runaway slaves. Moreover, he thought 
that the North must put an end to all agitation looking toward 
abolition, and advised the passage of an Amendment to the 
Constitution embodying some machinery by which the South 
should for ever enjoy equal power with the North, no matter 
what the population and resources of the two sections might 
be. The third speech was made by Daniel Webster, of Massa- 
chusetts, on the 7th of March, 1850. It is always referred to 
as the "Seventh of March Speech," and created a most painful 
and profound sensation in the North. Webster declared for 
the compromise. He argued that slavery was "excluded by 
nature " from California and New Mexico. Why, then, put in 
a " Wilmot Proviso" as a taunt and reproach? These speeches 
were the work of men who were at the close of their careers. 
The fourth speech was made by one of the foremost of the 
younger men, William H. Seward. In 1848 he had stated 
in a public address, that " slavery can be limited to its present 
bounds; it can be ameliorated; it can and must be abolished, 
and you and I can and must do it." He now swept aside 
historical subtleties and constitutional precedents and declared 
" there is a higher law than the Constitution which regulates 
our authority over the domain and devotes it to the same 
noble purposes ['to union, to justice, to defence, to welfare, 
and to liberty ']." This appeal to " the higher law " marks the 
beginning of the end of the period of compromise. 

Meantime, Taylor had been managing the business in his 
own direct soldierly fashion, when, suddenly, in July, 1850, 
he died, and Millard Fillmore, the Vice-President and Seward's 



IX,] The Compromise of 1850. 241 

rival in New York, became President. At once there was 
a complete change in the political horizon. ^^^ ^^^_ 
Seward, who had been very strong owing to promise of 
his influence with Taylor, lost all power in the ^ ^°' 
administration. Webster became Secretary of State, and the 
compromise measures were passed, although not in the original 
form. California was admitted on her own terms; Texas 
received the promised price for her land; New Mexico and 
Utah were organized as territories, without any restriction as 
to slavery; the slave-trade was abolished within the precincts 
of the national capital; and a fugitive slave law was passed 
stringent enough to satisfy the Southern slave-holder. 

This last law was so severe, indeed, that it defeated its own 
objects. Among other things, the right to a jury ^^ ^^ . 
trial to determine the question of ownership was tive siave 
denied, and the act was ex post facto in its opera- '^^' ^ ^°' 
tion. The authors of the bill forgot, however, that while a jury 
trial was denied to the reclaimed slave, it was not and could 
not be denied to the rescuer of the negro from the hands of 
the fugitive slave hunter. Seward had stated in a speech, on 
this branch of the compromise, that a very mild fugitive slave 
law would be more efficacious than a severe one; but he had 
not been heeded. 

The slave-owners' agents now poured over Mason and 
Dixon's line to recover the property of their ^^ _ 

r i^ J Xhe attempts 

employers. It was found to be practically im- to enforce the 
possible to secure and retain possession of the 
coveted fugitives. These prosecutions attracted more attention 
to the slavery question in a few months than the Abolitionists 
had been able to arouse in twenty years. The most respected 
and respectable men bore prominent parts in the rescue of the 
reclaimed fugitives. On the other hand, the United States 
Deputy Marshals were often drawn from the lowest strata of 
society. Mr Charles Sumner, of Massachusetts, expressed the 
C. A. 16 



242 The Extension of Slavery. [Chap. 

popular feeling in a speech delivered in Faneuil Hall. The 
"public conscience," he affirmed, "will not allow a man who 
has trodden our streets as a free man to be dragged away as a 
slave." Sumner was soon afterwards elected to the United 
States Senate, where he and Hamilton Fish of New York, and 
B. F. Wade of Ohio formed with Seward and Chase a small 
but strong party, representing "the higher law," which rules 
the "public conscience." These same years (1850-52) that 
witnessed this uprising of the "public conscience" in the 
North witnessed the death of Calhoun, Clay, and Webster, and 
the return of Jefferson Davis to political life. It was then also 
that "Uncle Tom's Cabin" was published. This latter may 
well be regarded as a political event of the utmost importance, 
although its import was not discerned at the time. No other 
American book, perhaps no other work of fiction, has ever 
had the same degree of success as Mrs. Stowe's "Uncle Tom." 
Three hundred thousand copies were sold within a year. The 
story was dramatized and placed on the stage, where it had 
an unprecedented success. It is not unlikely that the de- 
scription of slavery is overdrawn in the sense that all the 
hardships and outrages therein set forth were seldom if ever 
felt by any one particular slave; the description of "Southern 
Society " also is defective. The most curious thing in the 
story of the book is the fact that it was extremely popular 
in the South. Whatever its merits or demerits, its ultimate 
influence was tremendous. The Northern boys who read 
"Uncle Tom's Cabin" in 1852-58 were the voters of i860 
and the soldiers of 1861-65. 

The signing of the Fugitive Slave Act has blackened the 

memory of Millard Fillmore in later days, but at 

The Election ^^ x^xmt it aroused little comment. He was the 

of 1852. 

strongest candidate for the nomination of the 
Whig party, and would have secured it, had not Webster's 
friends refused to co-operate with his. As it turned out. 



IX.] Mrs. Stowes Uncle Tom s Cabin. 243 

General Scott was nominated, but he was defeated at the polls 
by Franklin Pierce of Vermont, the Democratic candidate. 
The latter received two hundred and fifty-four electoral votes 
against forty-two given to Scott. The result was unexpected, 
but is easily to be explained. Scott was a man of pretentious 
habits and was exceedingly fond of display. Ridicule always 
exerts great influence in politics, and the Democrats heaped 
ridicule on the old soldier. The real reason for his defeat, 
however, was a desire on the part of the people for rest from 
political strife, and a conviction that the Democrats were less 
likely to disturb the Compromise of 1850 than were the Whigs. 
In this the voters reckoned without the politician and were 
soon undeceived. 

The foremost Democratic Senator from the North was 
Stephen Arnold Douglas of Illinois. In January, ^^^^ Kansas- 
1854, he introduced the measure which was Nebraska bui, 
known in its later stages as the Kansas-Nebraska ^ ^'*' 
Bill. The precise motives which led Mr Douglas to take this 
step have been the subj ect of much controversy. Some students 
think that a desire to conciliate Southern support in aid of his 
pretensions to the presidency was the leading motive; but this 
has been alleged against almost every prominent politician 
who has done anything out of the common run. Other 
writers think that some concession was necessary in 1854 
in order to avert secession, and that Douglas, realizing this, 
hastened to meet the slave-owners more than half-way. The 
proposed plan provided for the organization of all of the 
Louisiana Purchase north of the Missouri Compromise line 
(36° 30'), and west of the States of Missouri and Iowa, into a 
territory under the name of Nebraska. It was designed that 
this territory should be admitted into the Union at some future 
time either as one State, or as several States — " with or without 
slavery as their constitution may prescribe at the time." This 
proposed territory lay north of the line of the Missouri Com- 

16 2 



244 The Extension of Slavery. [Chap. 

promise which had "for ever forbidden" slavery north of the 
southern boundary of Missouri and west of that State. Mr 
Douglas maintained, however, that the Missouri Compromise 
had practically been repealed in 1850, and that his bill merely 
proposed to extend the principle of local option or "squatter 
sovereignty," as it was now termed, to the settlement of the 
slavery question in the territory acquired in 1803, as it had 
been applied in 1850 to the settlement of the dispute in the 
territory acquired from Mexico. The measure as finally passed 
provided for the establishment of two territories, Kansas and 
Nebraska, instead of one as had at first been proposed. 

Public opinion was aroused as it never had been aroused 
^ ^ ^ before. Douglas was an able debater and a 

Debate on ° 

the Kansas- skilful manager. Chase, Seward, Sumner, and 

e ras a i . \Yade wcrc brilliant men, but they had few 
followers. The bill passed the Senate by thirty-seven votes to 
fourteen. It subsequently passed the House of Representa- 
tives, and became law with the consent of President Pierce. A 
few sentences culled from the speeches made during the debate 
in the Senate will show better than any description the con- 
dition of public opinion on the slavery question in 1854. 
Douglas reproduced the argument contained in Webster's 
"Seventh of March Speech," "that slavery was excluded by 
nature," and asserted that it "was worse than folly to think of 
Nebraska being a slave-holding country." The conclusion was 
that the matter was of no great moment after all. Seward, how- 
ever, did not agree with this, and asserted that" one slave-holder 
in a new territory, with access to the executive ear at Washington, 
exercised more political influence than five hundred freemen." 
Sumner, for his part, seemed to welcome the issue and declared : 
"To every man in the land, it says . . . 'Are you for freedom or 
are you for slavery?' And every man in the land must answer 
this question when he votes." Some time after the passage of 
the bill, he stated that " it [the Kansas-Nebraska bill] annuls 



IX.] TJie Kansas-Nebraska Bill, 1854. 245 

all past compromises with slavery, and makes all future com- 
promises impossible. Thus it puts freedom and slavery face 
to face and bids them grapple. Who can doubt the result?" 
Some of the leading opponents of the measure summed up 
their objections to it in an important document written by 
Chase and Giddings, an anti-slavery member of the House of 
Representatives from Ohio; Sumner and Gerrit Smith also 
afforded some assistance. The paper is known as the " Appeal 
of the Independent Democrats. " In it, the bill is characterized 
as "a gross violation of a sacred pledge; as a criminal betrayal 
of precious rights. . . . Take your maps, fellow-citizens, we 
entreat you, and see what country it is which this bill gratui- 
tously and recklessly proposes to open to slavery." As to the 
statement, contained in an amendment to the Kansas-Nebraska 
bill, that the Missouri Compromise was suspended and made 
inoperative by the principles of the legislation of 1850, a post- 
script to the "Appeal" declares this to be "a manifest 
falsification of the truth of history." There seems to have 
been some ground for the statement that the boon was in 
the nature of a gratuitous gift, and it also would seem 
probable that a few of the Southern leaders hesitated to 
accept it. Mr Rhodes, the historian of this period, in sum- 
ming up the whole matter, writes in effect that the Kansas- 
Nebraska Act was the most momentous measure that had 
ever passed the United States Congress. It doomed the 
Whig party and made the new Republican party a no-slavery 
party. By arousing the passions of many influential persons, 
it prevented the further execution of the fugitive slave law. 
It made the German immigrants in the West Republicans. 
It lost New England to the Democrats, and made the great 
North-west Republican, and finally it led to the downfall of 
the Democratic party. 

The principle of "squatter sovereignty" or "popular 
sovereignty " on which Douglas relied to justify the bill, 



246 The Extension of Slavery. [Chap. 

was thus defined by him : " the people [of each state or 
territory] shall be left free to regulate their 
Sovrre^eiuy " domestic concerns in their own way, subject 
only to the Constitution of the United States." 
Douglas's ablest opponent in Illinois was Abraham Lincoln, 
who had already served one term in Congress — entering the 
House of Representatives in the same session when Jefferson 
Davis first took his seat as Senator. Everything that Lincoln 
had said during those two years of his Congressional career 
was said from the heart and was worthy the man and his cause. 
He was not re-elected, however, and likewise failed to secure 
an office from the administration. He then returned to the 
practice of the law and achieved considerable success. Now 
re-entering political life with vigour and earnestness, he thus 
stated the weak point of the principle of " squatter sovereignty " 
as it was proposed to be applied in the new territories. " I 
admit," said Lincoln, "that the emigrant to Kansas and 
Nebraska is competent to govern himself, but I deny his 
right to govern any other person without that person's con- 
sent." Moreover, he affirmed that blood would be shed in 
the assertion of popular sovereignty and asked "Will not 
the first drop of blood so shed be the real knell of the 
Union?" Douglas confessed that Lincoln's masterly opposi- 
tion gave him more concern than all the speeches made in the 
Senate. 

The voters expressed their views of the Kansas-Nebraska 

policy in the election of a new House of Rep- 

congressionai reseutatives in the autumn of 1854. The 

election of 1854. ''^ 

Democrats had a majority of over eighty in the 
Congress which passed the bill. In the Congress elected in 
1854, they were in a minority of nearly eighty. Of the forty- 
two Northern Democrats who had voted for the bill, seven 
only were re-elected. The result of this election might have 
been even more decisive but for a contest then raging in 



IX.] The Struggle for Kansas. 247 

some parts of the North, on the question of "the foreign 
element." The organization called forth by this contest 
was known as the Know-nothing party because its members 
when questioned by outsiders as to their principles and 
methods, professed an entire ignorance. 

The doctrine of "squatter sovereignty" may have been 
right in the abstract. It must be conceded 
that the Kansas-Nebraska Act, in providing no fo^K^anl'^s^^'^ 
efficient means for ascertaining the will of the 
"squatter sovereign," was fatally incomplete. This was soon 
evident. The friends and the enemies to slave-extension at 
once prepared to occupy Kansas. The slave-owners seem 
to have regarded that territory as rightfully theirs, mainly 
because it was next to Missouri. But many earnest persons in 
the North were determined that Kansas should be free soil. 
They had wealth and mobility on their side. An emigration 
aid society was organized, and settlers were sent to Kansas 
promptly and in considerable numbers. The headquarters 
of the free settlers was the town of Lawrence, named in honour 
of Abbot Lawrence, a wealthy manufacturer of Massachusetts, 
who contributed largely to the expenses of the free colonization. 
The slave-holders were wealthy, but in a way not favourable to 
rapid movement. Their wealth consisted in lands and slaves. 
The lands could be sold or mortgaged, but either was a matter 
of time. But given the means, the migration of a slave-owner 
with his slaves to an unknown region, whose climate might 
prove fatal to the blacks, was an enterprise not to be lightly 
begun. One of the earlier slave-holders in Kansas was obliged 
to cut the firewood with his own hands to keep his slaves from 
freezing. This and similar experiences must have deterred 
many Southerners from emigrating. At all events, the majority 
of the bona fide settlers were favourable to freedom. To counter- 
act their votes, hundreds of Missourians crossed the border 
into Kansas to vote. The upshot of the whole matter was 



248 TJie Extension of Slavery. [Chap. 

that the free-state voters refused to vote. The territorial 
legislature thus fell into the hands of the pro-slavery menj 
but the fraud and intimidation used to bring about this result, 
converted many to the anti-slavery side. The most prominent 
of these converts was Reeder, the territorial Governor appointed 
by Pierce. Indeed, three governors, sent out to Kansas 
as good Democrats, were speedily converted to free-state 
ideas. The free settlers held a convention of their own, formed 
a constitution, and applied to Congress for the admission of 
Kansas to the Union as a free State. One of the speeches 
made in Congress at this time must be described at some 
length. 

This was Charles Sumner's speech, which was afterwards 

printed under the title of "The Crime against 
s ^eech"^'^'^ Kansas." The entire proceeding in the Kansas 

business Mr Sumner regarded as " a crime with- 
out example in the records of the past." The speaker reflected 
in unmeasured and exasperating language on Senator Butler 
of South Carolina, and Senator Douglas, whom he likened to 
Don Quixote and Sancho Panza. Butler was further described 
as having chosen "the harlot Slavery" for his Dulcinea del 
Toboso. The whole speech showed to what depths a scholar 
can descend when thoroughly aroused. The sequel showed 
some of the effects produced by slavery on civilization. A few 
days after this speech was delivered, Preston S. Brooks, one of 
the Representatives from South Carolina, entered the Senate 
Chamber where Sumner was sitting at his desk busy with his 
papers. Standing over him as he was writing, and with scarcely 
a note of warning, Brooks struck him over the head with a 
large walking stick, and with all the skill and energy of a 
whilom cavalryman. The cane broke under the blow, when 
Brooks seizing Sumner struck him again and again with the 
end which remained in his hand, until, finally, his arm was 
arrested by a spectator. Sumner fell to the floor covered with 



IX.] TJie Assault on Stunner. 249 

blood. The blows proved to have reached the spinal column. 
Sumner never recovered his full physical vigour, but the skilful 
treatment of Dr Brown-Sequard enabled him again to enter 
public life in 1859 — his first speech in the Senate after this 
affair being on the "Barbarism of Slavery." Instead of re- 
buking Brooks, the Southerners received him as a champion, 
and his constituents returned him to Congress with only six 
dissenting votes. The students of the University of Virginia 
voted him "a splendid cane . . . with a gold head " in token of 
their admiration. In the North, the assault was regarded as 
cowardly, and Seward declared that "the blows that fell on 
the head of the Senator from Massachusetts have done more 
for the cause of human freedom " than all the speeches ever 
made in the national Congress. Five hundred thousand copies 
of the "Crime against Kansas" were placed in the hands of 
the people. Curiously enough, Sumner lived to see the eman- 
cipation of the slaves, while Butler and Brooks died within 
three years of the assault. 

Meantime, free emigrants rushed to Kansas in large 
numbers. There was much fighting between „. ^ 

° ° The Lecomp- 

the two factions. Some of these affairs were ton Conven- 
disgraceful, such as the massacre of the slave par- 
tisans at Pottawotamie by a band led by John Brown, and the 
destruction of Lawrence by men of the pro-slavery faction. 
Ultimately, the contest was brought to a head by the action 
of a constitutional convention held at Lecompton. The dele- 
gates to this convention had been elected under a law passed by 
the territorial legislature, which the free-state settlers did not 
recognize as a legal body, and about one-third of the votes cast 
at the election were fraudulent. Nevertheless, the free-state 
people were induced to remain quiet by the promise that the 
constitution proposed by this convention should be submitted 
to the people of the territory for ratification. The question 
finally submitted to the voters, however, was not whether 



250 The Extension of Slavery. [Chap. 

Kansas should be a free State or a slave State, but whether 
it should be a State with unlimited slavery or with limited 
slavery. This trickery proved to be more than Douglas and 
many other Northern Democrats could bear. He broke with 
the administration, which, in its turn, attacked him with every 
means in its power. Douglas gained popularity in the North, 
where it was asserted that his doctrine of "squatter sovereignty" 
was right, since it had gained, or at all events, would gain 
Kansas to the cause of freedom. A general election was now 
near at hand, and efforts were made to effect a compromise 
of some kind. This took the form of an attempt to induce the 
people of Kansas to consent to the admission of Kansas as 
a slave State, in consideration of large additional grants of 
valuable land. A fair election was then held, and Kansas 
refused to enter the Union on these terms, by a vote of 
nearly eleven thousand to over two thousand votes. 

In 1858, there occurred in Illinois one of the most fiercely 
contested political campaigns in the history of 
D(^'Ta1" ^"^ ^^ United States, and one of the most important, 
in that it made Lincoln a prominent candidate 
for the presidency. Douglas's term of office as Senator from 
Illinois would expire in 1859. Lincoln determined to contest 
the seat in the interest of the new Republican party. In his 
first address, he thus defined the issue, in language which 
startled the country: "'A house divided against itself cannot 
stand,' ... I believe this government cannot endure perma- 
nently half slave and half free. ... It [the Union] will be- 
come all one thing or all the other." He challenged Douglas 
to meet him in a series of joint debates, and Douglas con- 
sented. Seven debates were arranged for and held. No 
halls could be found large enough to hold the crowds who 
came to witness these battles of the giants. In the end, 
Douglas was returned to the Senate ; but Lincoln had won a 
national reputation. The " house-divided-against-itself " doc- 



Tx.] The Dred Scott Decision, 1857. 251 

trine, first enunciated by Lincoln, was reiterated by Seward in 
a speech which probably had more influence in forming Northern 
opinion than any other one speech made before the war. 
Seward said that between slavery and freedom "there is an 
irrepressible conflict . . . the United States must and will, 
sooner or later, become either entirely a slave-holding nation 
or entirely a free-labour nation." 

The only political organization which now united the two 
sections — ■ the free North and the slave-holding 
Souths was the Democratic party, and in 1859 scoucase. 
the breach between the two wings of that party 
became irreparable. To comprehend the demands then 
made by the Slave-power, it will be necessary to go back 
to 1857, and glance at the decision of the Supreme Court 
in the Dred Scott case. Into the circumstances of this 
case we need not enter. It is sufficient to say that Dred 
Scott was, or, at all events, had been, a slave. The Supreme 
Court was then presided over by Chief Justice Taney, who, as 
Secretary of the Treasury, had removed the deposits in Jackson's 
time. The decision was in effect (i) that a slave or the de- 
scendants of a slave had no standing in a United States Court; 
(2) that the Missouri Compromise, restricting the rights of the 
slave-owners in the national domain, was unconstitutional and 
hence null and void; and (3) that slave-owners could carry 
their slaves, as property, into any territory. Thus were the 
people of the North told by the highest interpreter of the Con- 
stitution that under that instrument nothing could be done for 
the slaves, and nothing could be done to prevent the occu- 
pation of the public domain by slave-holders. 

In 1859, the Slave-power demanded the execution of the 
Constitution as interpreted by the Supreme Court. ^^^ siave- 
Senator Brown of Mississippi asserted that the holders' de- 
slave-holders "have a right of protection for their ""^^ 3,159. 
slave property in the territories." Jefferson Davis, the other 



252 TJie Extension of Slavery. [Chap. 

Senator from Mississippi, went one step farther, claiming that 
slave property deserved a greater measure of protection than 
ordinary property, as it was subject to greater risks. "Adequate 
protection " must be given. That a very large measure of pro- 
tection would be required to secure the prolonged existence of 
slavery was soon . made evident by the intense excitement 
aroused by the publication and extended sale of Helper's The 
Impending Crisis of the South : How to jneet it, and by the 
execution of John Brown. 

Helper was a "poor white " of North Carolina. His book 

was an arraignment of slavery from the point of 
Helper's /;«- yicw of E Southem free white labourer, and 

non-slave-holder. Among other things. Helper 
" longed to see the day when the negroes shall be removed 
from the United States, and their places iilled by white men." 
If slavery should be abolished Helper thought that manufac- 
turing might become an industry in the South. Then the small 
farmer would find a market for his produce in the thriving cities 
and towns, which would grow up about the mills as they had 
grown up in the North. The f armer ' s children would be educated, 
and the social position of the poor white raised to the level of 
the mechanics and farmers of the North. A gentleman who 
was then in Washington, and was for many years in active service 
under the government, and who enjoyed considerable opportu- 
nities for observation, says of this book that its publication did 
more than anything else to arouse the fears of the Slave-power. 
Mr Rhodes states the matter as follows: "Had the poor white 
been able to read and comprehend such an argument, slavery 
would have been doomed to destruction, for certainly, seven 
voters out of ten in the slave States were non-slave-holding 
whites." The little tract suddenly bounded into notice, its 
genuineness being attested by many Republican leaders. The 
Southern politicians were furious. They opposed the election 
of John Sherman as Speaker of the House, on the ground that 



IX.] Helper and JoJin Brown. 253 

he had been one of those who had vouched for the genuineness 
of the pamphlet. "No man," said they, who had endorsed 
the book, "was fit to be Speaker of the House of Repre- 
sentatives." 

John Brown came of good New England stock, and was 
imbued with the old Puritan idea that God was 
on the side of the successful soldier. He had John Brown, 
conducted himself in Kansas in a manner which 
met with the strong disapprobation of many persons interested 
in the struggle against the extension of slavery. He suddenly 
appeared with a handful of men at Harper's Ferry, Virginia, 
at the confluence of the Shenandoah and Potomac Rivers. 
There was an United States Arsenal at that point, and Brown 
designed to seize the buildings and arms stored therein, and 
to use them for the purpose of arming the slaves. He 
seized the arsenal in the dead of night, and, at the head 
of nineteen men, defied the United States and the State of 
Virginia. Brown was captured with all but two of his followers. 
On December 2nd, 1859, he was executed at Charlestown, 
Virginia, on a charge of murder and treason. " So perish all 
such enemies of Virginia," exclaimed Colonel Preston, as the 
body dropped through the trap of the scaffold, " So perish all 
such enemies of the Union ! All such enemies of the human 
race ! " The poet Longfellow, in his quiet study at Cambridge, 
Massachusetts, viewed the matter in a somewhat different 
light, and jotted down in his journal: "Even now, as I write, 
they are leading old John Brown to execution in Virginia, 
for attempting to rescue slaves ! This is sowing the wind 
to reap the whirlwind, which will come soon." It is also 
interesting to observe the divergent opinions held by two 
men who bore prominent parts in the war for the Union, 
Lincoln and the Massachusetts "war governor," John A. 
Andrew. The former stigmatized Brown's raid as "absurd " ; 
the latter stated the opinion — which was soon to be held by 



254 Tlie Extension of Slavery. [Chap. 

many men — that no matter how foolish the undertaking may- 
have been, "John Brown himself is right." The man was 
raised to the level of a martyr, and singing his name, men 
marched into battle for the Union. Indeed, one cannot 
help speculating as to the sensations experienced by an on- 
looker of the execution, when, some three years later, a Massa- 
chusetts regiment, recruited by the son of Daniel Webster, 
and hence known as the "Webster Regiment," halted where 
the gallows once had stood, and poured forth that wonderful 
battle song, original with this regiment : 

" John Brown's body lies a-mouldering in the grave, 
But his soul goes marching on." 

The Democratic National Convention met at Charleston, 
^. ,. ^ South Carolina, in April, i860, to nominate a 

Disruption of j c i 7 

the Demo- succcssor to James Buchanan, then President of 

cratic party. ^^^ United States. The Slave-power demanded 

that the principles embodied in the Dred Scott decision should 
be adopted as the principles of the Democratic party — that the 
national government should "protect slavery." The Southern- 
ers felt the moral reproach under which they were living, and 
asserted that the blame for this was on the shoulders of the 
Northerners. " In the progress of civilization," said Yancey, a 
delegate from Mississippi, "the North-west has grown . . . into 
the free proportions of a giant people. We [the South] there- 
fore, as the minority, take the rights . . . of the minority." "The 
proposition you make will bankrupt us at the South. Ours is 
the property invaded." "The honour of our children, the 
honour of our females, the lives of our men, all rest on you. . . . 
You acknowledged that slavery was wrong, but that you were 
not to blame. That was your position, and it was wrong. I say 
. . . that your admission that slavery is wrong has been the cause 
of all this discord." The Northern Democrats, therefore, must 
assert that slavery is right. " Gentlemen of the South, " replied 
a delegate, Senator Pugh of Ohio, "we will not do it." The 



IX.] The Demands of the Slave-Power. 255 

Democratic party split in twain. The Southern extremists left 
the Convention, which was adjourned, to meet at Baltimore in 
June. But no agreement could be reached. The Northern 
Democrats nominated Douglas for President, and the Southern 
Democrats nominated Breckinridge, of Kentucky — at the 
moment occupying the position of Vice-President. The ultra- 
conservatives of all parties held a convention of their own, and 
nominated Governor Bell, of Tennessee, as the Constitutional 
Union Candidate. The Republican party, which was composed 
of various discordant elements, and which had made its first 
presidential contest in 1856, nominated Abraham Lincoln for 
the office of President. Seward was a more prominent man in 
the party; but he had been long in political life, and had 
made many enemies. Lincoln was therefore a safer candi- 
date, and was nominated for that reason and because of his 
presumed ability to carry several Western States. 

The issues upon which the campaign was fought must be 
adverted to again. Thelastdemandof the Slave- The De- 
power was stated by Mr Gaulden of Georgia, in ™iave-hoiders, 
the following speech, which was received with 1859. 
approval by the Southern members of the Charleston Conven- 
tion. Mr Gaulden stated his belief "that slavery is right, 
morally, religiously, socially, and politically. I believe that 
slavery has done more for this country, more for civilization, 
than all other interests put together. I would ask our Northern 
friends to give us all our rights, and take off the ruthless restric- 
tions which cut off the supply of slaves from foreign lands." 
The position of the slave-owners in i860 might be stated in a 
concise form as follows: Slavery is right, and we are unjustly 
accused of doing wrong; our s^ave property is expressly guar- 
anteed by the Constitution — the Northern people must use its 
power to protect this property; as slavery is right and entitled 
to protection, it should be encouraged by the re-establishment 
of the slave-trade. The most interesting part of the Southern 



256 The Extension of Slavery. [Chap. 

case is the contention that it was the Northerners who had cast 
the reproach on the slave-owner. Lincoln and the Republican 
leaders asserted, and with the utmost sincerity, that they had 
no intention of interfering with the institution of slavery where 
it existed. The Republicans were entirely distinct from those 
Abolitionists, like Phillips and Garrison, who refused to exer- 
cise their constitutional right to vote. Indeed the Abolitionists 
properly so called, namely, those who, if they had the power, 
would abolish slavery, had made small progress in the last 
twenty years. The Republicans, however, were opposed to the 
further extension of slavery. On this question they stood 
firmly and squarely on the ground occupied by the fathers of 
the Constitution, and justly named themselves Republican. 
They maintained, as the men of 1787 had maintained, 
that slavery should be regarded as a State matter — that the 
voters of each State could decide at any time, and change 
their minds as often as they chose, whether their State should 
be a slave-labour State, or a free-labour State. They denied, 
however, that the national government should be used as a 
machine to extend slavery. The dissensions in the Democratic 
party resulted in the election of Lincoln, the Republican leader. 
South Carolina, alone of all the States, adhered to the time- 
dishonoured practice of choosing presidential 
i86o^-6T^'°"' electors by vote of the legislature. Having 

performed that duty in November, i860, the 
legislature remained in session until the result of the election 
should be assured. When it was known that Lincoln had 
been elected, it provided for the calling of a State Con- 
vention, to be held on the 17th of December (i860), next 
following. On the 20th of that month, the people of 
South Carolina, in Convention assembled, repealed the ordi- 
nance of the Convention of 1788 ratifying the Constitution of 
the United States, and declared the Union between South 
Carolina and the other States dissolved. The Convention also 



IX.] Secession, 1860-61. 257 

issued a Declaration of Causes setting forth the reasons which 
had made this secession necessary. Before March, 1861, six 
other States: Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louis- 
iana, and Texas seceded. The people of these States seized 
the national property within the State limits, and only three 
military posts in the seceded States remained in the hands 
of the national authority when Lincoln took the oath of office 
on March 4th, i86i. 

C. A. 17 



CHAPTER X. iv 

•# 

THE WAR FOR THE UNION, 1861-65. 

The documents, wherein the politicians of South Carolina 

The Causes attempted to justify her course, furnish at once 

of the Civil the reason for secession and for the ultimate 

War 

defeat of the South in the War. So far as 
governmental ideas were concerned, the leaders of public 
opinion in the South in 1861 occupied the same ground that 
their great-grandfathers had occupied in 1776. Volumes have 
been written expounding the arguments for and against State- 
rights. It is not necessary for the proper understanding of 
the points at issue in 1861 to go into these arguments. The 
Southern States which seceded first and last were, broadly 
speaking, agricultural communities. This fact had led to the 
introduction of slavery in the beginning, and slavery, once 
established, had prevented those communities from becoming 
other than agricultural. There was only one city of any 
considerable importance in the whole slave-holding section, 
south of the Potomac. This was New Orleans, which, in 
i860, contained a population of one hundred and sixty-eight 
thousand. Moreover, its prosperity was due in great measure 
to the fact that it was, to a greater extent then than now, the 
entrepot for the commerce of the Mississippi Valley. The 
North, on the other hand, had developed into a country of 

258 



Chap, x.] The Causes of the Civil War. 259 

diversified interests, agriculture, manufactures, and commerce. 
The population was dense compared with that of the South. 
The city of New York alone contained eight hundred thousand 
inhabitants, and the population of Philadelphia was estimated 
at over half a million; while Baltimore, Boston, Brooklyn, 
Chicago, Cincinnati, and St Louis each contained over one hun- 
dred thousand souls. Moreover, throughout the North — with 
the exception of the newly settled North-west — there were to 
be found, every few miles along the lines of steam communi- 
cation, thriving manufacturing and commercial towns, some 
of them like Cleveland, Albany, and Lowell approaching the 
dimensions of cities. Of the one hundred and seven cotton 
mills in operation, ninety-nine were in the North. The material 
interests of the two sections were therefore entirely unlike. 
The North had outgrown the economic conditions of 1776, 
and at the same time had developed a new set of political 
theories. The representatives of each section, as if unconscious 
of the true nature of the dispute, endeavoured to justify their 
positions by appeals to the Constitution and by arguments 
based on that instrument. Mr Lodge has shown the fallacy 
of this mode of reasoning in his comments on Mr Webster's 
"Reply to Hayne." He asserts that in 1787-88 "there was 
not a man in the country . . . who regarded the new system as 
anything but an experiment entered upon by the States, and 
from which each and every State had the right peaceably to 
withdraw, a right which was very likely to be exercised." 
Gerry had stated the case very well at the time the con- 
stitution of the Senate was under consideration in the federal 
Convention. He then said : " We are neither the same nation 
nor different nations. We ought not, therefore, to pursue the 
one or the other of these ideas too closely." The Constitution 
of the United States, therefore, permitted of development in 
either or in both directions. Farther on, in speaking of the Nul- 
lification episode, Mr Lodge says: "The times had changed 

17 — 2 



26o The War for the Union. [Chap. 

and with them the popular conception of the government." 
Between 1830 and i860 the "times " had changed still more, and 
the conception of the nature of the federal government held by 
the mass of the people of the North in i860 was substantially 
that which Webster had laid down in his great speech. 
They believed the United States to be a nation. The mass 
of the Southern people held to the constitutional theories of 
Calhoun. Their idea of the nature of the general government 
may be gathered from the safeguards which the framers of the 
Constitution of the Confederacy placed around the States. In 
that document it is stated, for instance, that in the formation 
of the government each State "acted in its sovereign and 
independent character." In the Senate of the Confederacy, 
each State was represented by two Senators; but in certain 
cases, the votes should be taken by States and not by poll as 
is always the rule in the Senate of the United States. The 
State legislatures of the Confederate States possessed the right 
to impeach officers of the general government, and the process 
of amendment was simplified and made easy. On the other 
hand, the States of the Confederacy were limited in the exercise 
of the right to confer State citizenship. 

The Civil War was fought to determine which of these 
,, ^ , . conceptions of the nature of the federal tie 

Underlying ^ 

Causes of the should be adopted as the true interpretation 
Civil War. ^j ^^^ Constitution of the United States. As 

this interpretation is historically uncertain, we cannot speak 
of the war as a rebellion, for it was fought, so to say, to 
determine whether the seceders were rebels or not. Then, 
too, a movement on such a vast scale and extending over such 
a long space of time is something more than a rebellion — 
even when unsuccessful. Furthermore, the war was not begun 
to secure the destruction of slavery, although slavery was 
abolished as a result of the conflict. It may be regarded, 
however, from a Southern point of view, as a war waged to 



X.] Nature of the War. 261 

perpetuate slavery, since slavery was at the bottom of the social 
and material distinctions which separated the country into two 
irreconcilable sections. 

A Northern historical student, who has begun to study 
these matters since the close of the war, finds it 
difficult to understand why the Southern leaders ^?f.'^°'"'^, 

-' position, 1861. 

chose the occasion of Lincoln's election to put 
the secession theory into practice — especially as failure meant 
the establishment of nationalism. Lincoln had received an 
overwhelming majority of the electoral votes; but he had 
polled only a minority of the popular vote — the Republican 
ballots numbering one million eight hundred thousand to two 
million eight hundred thousand cast for the other candidates. 
Moreover, the Republicans were at first the smaller party in 
both Houses of Congress and were only placed in a majority 
by the withdrawal of the Senators and Representatives of the 
seceding States. Plainly, Mr Lincoln, the President of a 
minority and supported by a minority in Congress, had no 
mandate from the country to destroy Southern institutions or 
to establish Republican theories of nationalism. So long as 
the Southerners remained in Congress, it would have been im- 
possible for him to do these things or either of them. In 
point of fact, the Republicans could not have destroyed 
slavery so long as a condition of peace continued. The levying 
of war by the Southern leaders completely changed the aspect 
of affairs. The Republicans gained control of Congress, and 
the President became entitled to exercise his "war powers " as 
the constitutional commander-in-chief of the army and navy 
of the United States. Years before, John Quincy Adams had 
warned the slave-owners of their danger. "From the instant 
that your slave-holding States become the theatre of war," he 
said, "from that instant the war-powers of the Constitution 
extend to interference with the institution of slavery in every 
way." These words were uttered by ex-President Adams in 



262 The War for the Union. [Chap. 

1836. Recurring to the subject in 1842, he stated that in 
time of war, whether civil or foreign, municipal institutions 
give place to military authority. At such a time " so far from 
its being true that the States where slavery exists have the 
exclusive management of the subject, not only the President 
of the United States, but the commander of the army has 
power to order the universal emancipation of the slaves." 
The Southern slave-holders were undoubtedly correct in be- 
lieving that the moral sense of the people of the North was 
opposed to slavery; and that, therefore, the institution of 
slavery was doomed. It was this conviction that led to seces- 
sion — the election of Lincoln was only the pretext. 

It is probable that very many Southern leaders did not 
b bTt expect that separation would be of long con- 

of a Compro- tinuaucc. They hoped to make better terms 
™'^^' out of the Union than in it. The people of the 

North seemed to have reached the end of what might be called 
peaceable compromise; secession might bring about coercive 
compromise, so to speak. If Jackson had had his way in 
1833, or had Taylor lived two years longer, the efficacy of this 
new instrument might have been earlier tested. The conse- 
quences of failure never seem to have presented themselves to 
the Southern leaders. Probably they had never regarded failure 
as possible. The Southerners gave a new example of that 
condition of ignorance of the feelings and capacities of one's 
neighbours which is not unfamiliar to the student of European 
history. The people of the North and of the South, although 
living under one government, were wider apart than the peoples 
of many nations of modern times. On the surface, there 
seemed to be a basis for the confidence of the slave-holders. 

The area of the United States devoted to slavery was 
greater than that dedicated to free labour. A cursory 
examination of the map, therefore, would seem to settle the 
question in favour of the slave -power. Slavery, however, was 



X.] The North and the South. 263 

incompatible with density of population; and a study of 
the Census of i860 reveals the fact that of more „ , ,. 

Population 

than thirty-one million human beings who of the seceded 
then inhabited the United States, only about 
twelve millions dwelt in the slave States. As a partial offset 
to this disproportion in population, the Southern leaders ex- 
pected that the people of the newly settled regions of the 
North-west would side with them, or, at least, would remain 
neutral. At the very outset, the seceders met with two great 
disasters : the North-west threw its whole strength on the side 
of union and all the slave States did not secede. The popu- 
lation of the seceding States was in this way about three and 
one-half millions less than that of the slave-holding States. 
Subtracting this number from one side and adding it to the 
other, it is found that the States which seceded contained 
less than nine million inhabitants to more than twenty-two mil- 
lions living in the Union States. Moreover, of the nine millions 
dwelling in the former section about three and one-half millions 
were negro slaves. The free population of the Confederate 
States was only about five and one-half millions. The entire 
adult male white population of the seceding States was only 
two million seven hundred and ninety-nine thousand and the 
federal government had on its muster rolls in May 1865 over 
one million men, exclusive of those serving in the navy. In 
this connection one more fact may be stated. There were 
only about three hundred and fifty thousand slave-holders in 
the whole country in i860, and probably not more than two 
millions of white persons were supported directly by slave 
labour. 

President Buchanan, a Democrat, occupied the position of 
chief magistrate at the time of the secession of „ , 

° _ Buchanan s 

South Carolina. He possessed constitutional constitutional 
scruples against coercing a "sovereign State"; scruples, 
and the possibility of coercing a Southerner seems not to 



264 TJie War for the Union. [Chap. 

have occurred to him. Nor was the doctrine yet invented 
which comforted many a Northern Democrat later on — that 
the sovereign State of Pennsylvania or New York might wage 
war on the sovereign State of South Carolina. The constitu- 
tional position of the administration was extraordinary. It 
seemed to be admitted that South Carolina was sufificiently 
'' sovereign " to seize the forts, arsenal, and military equipment 
of the United States which might happen to be within her 
borders; but was not sufficiently "sovereign " to be warred on 
and coerced by a presumably sovereign government like the 
United States. South Carolina commissioners appeared at 
Washington to arrange for a partition of the public debt and 
assets, for although "out of the Union" in this sense she was 
"in the Union" as regards coercion. 

On the I St of January, 1861, many Republican State 
governors, Andrew of Massachusetts and Blair of Michigan, 
for example, were sworn into office in the North. They were 
not content to allow matters to drift along, and began making 
preparations for war. Some of them, like Andrew, ordered 
arms and ammunition from foreign firms on their own re- 
sponsibility, and thus were enabled to equip their State troops 
for service and send them to Washington within a day or two 
after the fall of Fort Sumter. 

Abraham Lincoln was inaugurated President on March 4th, 
1 86 1. He was a typical man of the people, and 

Lincoln's •' *^ ^ ^ ^ 

Inaugural represented that which was soundest m Ameri- 

Address. ^^^ j- ^^^ pj-^ {^^-j^gj. belonged to that most dis- 

couraging class — the " poor white " of the South. Absolutely 
without early advantages, Abraham Lincoln raised himself by 
his own efforts to the highest position in the gift of his fellow- 
men. In his seriousness and in his humour, nay even in his 
ungainly person and kindly face, he stood for the American 
people. In his inaugural address he stated that he considered 
" that in the view of the Constitution and the laws, the Union 



X.] Lincoln's Inauguration. 265 

is unbroken, and to the extent of my ability I shall take care, 
as the Constitution itself expressly enjoins upon me, that the- 
laws of the Union be faithfully executed in all the States." 
Appealing to the Southerners, he said: "In your hands, 
my dissatisfied fellow-countrymen, and not in mine, is the 
momentous issue of civil war . . . You have no oath registered 
in Heaven to destroy the Government, while I have the most 
solemn one to preserve, protect, and defend it." 

He gathered about him a cabinet of able men: Seward, 
Secretary of State, Chase, Secretary of the 
Treasury, Cameron, and later Stanton, Secretary o^c"'^"'"'^ 
of War, and Welles, Secretary of the Navy. Mr 
Seward at first appears to have regarded himself as the head of 
the government ; but Lincoln quietly set him in his proper 
place, and throughout the war exercised himself the great 
powers conferred on him, although he always took advice as to 
any important matter. In pursuance of the conciliatory yet 
firm line of policy enunciated in his inaugural address, he sent 
word to the Governor of South Carolina that the federal 
garrison in Fort Sumter would be provisioned. Then ensued 
the bombardment and capture of that fort by the Southerners, 
on April 14th, 1861. The next day President Lincoln issued a 
proclamation calling for seventy-five thousand volunteers. This 
document, which was elaborated with great skill, contains an 
admirable statement of the points in controversy from the 
Northern standpoint. 

"The laws of the United States," said the President, "have 
been for some time past, and now are opposed, 
and the execution thereof obstructed in the States ^ Lincoln's 

Proclamation. 

of South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Florida, 
Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas, by combinations too power- 
ful to be suppressed by the ordinary course of judicial pro- 
ceedings. 

"Now, therefore, I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the 



266 The War for the Union. [Chap. 

United States, in virtue of the power in me vested by the Con- 
stitution and the laws, have thought fit to call forth, and 
hereby do call forth, the militia of the several States of the 
Union, to the aggregate number of seventy-five thousand, in 
order to suppress said combinations, and to cause the laws to be 
duly executed. 

" I appeal to all loyal citizens to favour, facilitate, and aid 
this effort to maintain the honour, the integrity, and existence 
of our national Union, and the perpetuity of popular govern- 
ment, and to redress wrongs already long enough endured. 

"And I hereby command the persons composing the com- 
binations aforesaid to disperse and retire peaceably to their 
respective abodes, within twenty days from this date." He 
also summoned Congress to meet on July 4th, 1861, 

The response to this call for aid was more hearty than 
even Lincoln, in his simple faith in the righteous- 
teer^^oT°86i"" ^^^^ °^ ^^^ causc, could have hoped for; many 
times seventy-five thousand men prepared to 
answer the summons. Douglas, his late rival for the presi- 
dency, promised the President his hearty support, and this fact 
telegraphed over the country turned many a doubting mind. 
The ex-Presidents, Franklin Pierce and James Buchanan, also 
"came out for the Union," now that the seceders had levied 
war on the national government. 

Four days later, on April 19th, 1861 — the anniversary of 
the battles of Lexington and Concord — the Sixth 
stltes'"'^"'^'^^'^ Massachusetts Regiment, hastening to the de- 
fence of the capital, was attacked by a mob while 
marching through the streets of Baltimore, and several men 
were killed and wounded. This was the first bloodshed of the 
war, for the garrison of Fort Sumter had surrendered to starva- 
tion. Baltimore was soon cut off from the rest of the country. 
But troops proceeded by way of Annapolis, and soon Wash- 
ington and Maryland were saved for the Union. Delaware, 



X.] Progress of Secession. 267 

also, in which slavery existed, took the same side. In Missouri 
there was a large body of men favourable to the cause of 
secession. But, largely through the exertions of General Lyon, 
who lost his life in the struggle, Missouri was prevented from 
joining the Southern cause. Kentucky also was saved, after 
giving the administration considerable anxiety. The people of 
the western part of Virginia had no sympathy with secession. 
They were outvoted in the State Convention by the delegates 
from the eastern part of the State; but, with the aid of a small 
Union army, they seceded from Virginia. Later, in 1862, that 
section was admitted to the Union as the State of West 
Virginia — -although not without straining a point of constitu- 
tional interpretation. Tennessee, Arkansas, and the remainder 
of Virginia seceded from the Union and joined the extreme 
Southern States in their resistance to the federal authorities. 

Men who already had some knowledge of military methods 
naturally came to the front in the early days of 
recruiting. Among them was Ulysses S. Grant, Qrant^'^^^ 
of Galena, Illinois. He had been educated at 
West Point, the government military training school, and had 
served with the colours during the Mexican War. He now 
entered with great energy into the contest; and acting under 
the authority of the Governor of Illinois, he seized the town of 
Cairo, in the extreme south-western corner of that State, where 
the Ohio joins the Mississippi. Soon afterwards he took pos- 
session of Paducah, at the junction of the Ohio and Tennessee 
Rivers. These two opportune seizures prevented the Confed- 
erates from using the Ohio River as their first line of de- 
fence. 

The earliest considerable conflict of the war, however, was 
the battle of Bull Run, in Virginia. At the first 
glance, the conditions of warfare east of the of^^gfnfa.^^ 
Alleghanies seem difficult to comprehend. But 
a knowledge of the field of operations will help to diminish the 



268 TJie War for the Union. [Chap. 

difficulty of understanding the strategy of the Virginia cam- 
paigns. The eastern portion of Virginia is divided into two 
unequal parts by a mountain chain, whose axis is parallel to the 
Alleghany system, and which is known as the Blue Ridge. 
Between the Blue Ridge and the Alleghanies proper flows the 
Shenandoah River, in a general northerly direction, emptying 
into the Potomac River at Harper's Ferry. The Potomac 
forms the northern boundary of Virginia, which is intersected 
by numerous large rivers having their sources in the Blue Ridge 
and flowing parallel to the Potomac in a general west to east 
direction. The most northerly of these subsidiary rivers is the 
Rappahannock, which at several places approaches to within a 
few miles of the Potomac, notably at Fredericksburg. The 
principal branch of the Rappahannock is the Rapidan, and just 
south of these rivers and near their confluence is a stretch of 
sparsely settled country, known locally as the Wilderness, and 
containing among other hamlets Spottsylvania and Chancellors- 
ville. Other important streams are the York, which is formed 
of the Mattapony and Pamunkey Rivers, and the James, upon 
which the important city of Richmond is situated. Midway 
between the York and James Rivers flows a smaller stream, 
the Chickahominy. The Valley of the Shenandoah, lying 
at right angles to the sources of these rivers, is connected 
with eastern Virginia by a series of passes or "gaps," to 
use the local name, through one of which, Manassas Gap, ran 
a railroad connecting the Valley with a trunk line which 
leaves the Potomac opposite Washington and runs southward 
parallel with the Blue Ridge. The junction of these two 
lines of railroad was near a small stream called Bull Run. 
The protection of Washington demanded the closing of the 
Shenandoah Valley and holding of the line of the Rappa- 
hannock. The Confederate plan of campaign was to hold the 
federal army fast on one of these lines and force it back on the 
other. To either party Manassas Junction was of the utmost 



X.] Battle of Bull Run. 269 

importance, as the possession of the Manassas Gap railroad 
would enable the possessor to reinforce his army in the 
Valley or in front of Washington with both ease and speed. 
Manoeuvring to gain this point brought on the first battle of 
Bull Run (July 21, 1861). The federal plan of campaign 
was that McDowell, with the main Union army, 
should advance southward from Washington „ ,,^^"'^ °1 

*^ £31111 Kun, lOOI. 

and drive the Confederates, posted near Bull 
Run, over the Rappahannock and back towards Richmond. 
At the same time, General Patterson was to press the Con- 
federate force in the Valley under Joseph E. Johnston and 
prevent reinforcements being sent to Beauregard at Bull Run. 
But Patterson, instead of advancing, retreated. Johnston put 
his men on the railway cars and transported them to Bull Run 
in time to decide the conflict. After a fierce combat, the 
Union army was routed and fled in a panic to the Potomac 
and Washington. This closed the campaign in the East. 
McDowell was supplanted by George B. McClellan, who had 
won some easy victories in West Virginia, at such extraor- 
dinarily named places as Vienna and Philippi. He proved 
to be a great organizer and drill-master. Recruits poured in 
to the defence of Washington, and the Army of the Potomac 
emerged from its winter camps a thoroughly organized body of 
men. The disaster at Bull Run had served to arouse the 
North. It had served also to disorganize the Confederate 
army, for many Southerners, regarding the war as over, left 
the front to resume their usual occupations. 

Meantime the country seemed to be fast drifting towards a 
conflict with Great Britain. That power, as well 
as France, had accorded belligerent rights to the „ ''^^o*".'^^ °^ 

' ° o Great Britain. 

Southerners almost at the outset, urged thereto, 
doubtless, by the proclamation of a blockade of the Southern 
ports. It seemed likely that they might even go farther, and 
acknowledge the independence of the Confederacy — although 



2/0 The War for the Uniojt. [Chap. 

this was never done. To hasten this result, however, the 
Southern government despatched two commissioners to Europe. 
Elscaping through the blockading fleet, they embarked at 
Havanna on board of the British mail steamer Trent, and 
were removed from the deck of that vessel, on the high seas, 
by a boarding party from the United States war-ship San 
Jacinto. This act aroused great indignation in Great Britain, 
and war seemed imminent. Fortunately, the commander of the 
San Jacinto, either from ignorance or for some other reason, 
had not complied with all the formalities required by the rules 
of International Law. The United States was able, therefore, 
to give up the commissioners without loss of honour. Indeed, 
Mr Seward gave the matter rather the air of a triumph by 
reminding the British government that the United States had 
always resisted the exercise of a similar right of search on the 
part of Great Britain, and added that the American people now 
did to "the British nation just what we have always insisted all 
nations ought to do to us. " The readiness with which the British 
government seized the first opportunity to embarrass the Union 
government created a bitterness of feeling in America which 
was not lessened by the laxity shown by Great Britain in en- 
forcing international obligations in the case of the Alabama 
and other Confederate vessels. It is easy to understand the 
apprehension with which many English statesmen viewed the 
increasing power of the United States, and the welcome which 
some of them, Mr Gladstone, for instance, would have given to 
the new "nation," as he denominated the Confederacy. It is 
not so easy to understand the sympathy which existed between 
English "society" and the Southern slave-owners, who had, 
only a few months before, clamoured for the reopening of 
the African slave-trade. Apart from the governing classes the 
mass of the British nation sympathized with the North. Some 
leading men, as John Bright and Goldwin Smith, strongly 
supported the Northern side; and the heroic qualities dis- 



X.] Early Campaigns in the West. 271 

played by the Lancashire operatives in bearing the miseries 
inflicted by the blockade still arouse admiration on both sides 
of the Atlantic. 

The Confederate line of defence in the West extended from 
the mountains to the Mississippi. If one runs 
one's eye along the northern boundary of Ten- to^Doneison^ 
nessee, one can easily discern the important 
points in this first line of defence. At Cumberland Gap the 
boundary leaves the mountains and' reaches the Mississippi a 
little to the north of New Madrid and Island No. 10. These 
two points formed the two ends of the Confederate line. The 
Cumberland River, rising to the west of Cumberland Gap, flows 
south and west by Mill Spring to Nashville. At that point it 
bends sharply to the north, and empties into the Ohio not far 
from the mouth of the Tennessee. The latter river, rising in 
Virginia to the east of Cumberland Gap, flows at first nearly 
south, passing Knoxville a few miles to the east and later 
Chattanooga. It then turns slowly to the west, and at Florence 
sharply bends to the north and empties into the Ohio at Pa- 
ducah. These two rivers pursuing similar semicircular courses 
formed natural lines of defence against invasion. In January, 
1862, a Union army led by General George H. Thomas defeated 
an equal force of Confederates at the battle of Mill Spring, and 
compelled the abandonment of the upper Cumberland valley. 
At a point where the two rivers in their northerly courses 
approach to within ten miles of each other, the Confederates 
had constructed two forts, Fort Henry on the Tennessee, and 
Fort Donelson on the Cumberland. These strongholds com- 
manded the navigation of the two streams, and had to be 
captured before any invasion could be undertaken by the 
Northern forces. This was handsomely accomplished by an 
army under Grant, and a co-operating naval force under Foote 
(Feb. 1862). In the following March, another Union army 
under Pope seized New Madrid and Island No. 10. The 



2/2 TJie War for the Union. [Chap. 

next month witnessed the capture of New Orleans by a naval 
force commanded by Farragut. 

The city of New Orleans stands on the river's bank a few 
feet only above the surface of the stream. It is 

Farragut ■' 

captures New about one hundred miles from the mouth of the 
'^ ^^"^' great river, and was protected from attack by the 

shallowness of the water at the river's mouth, by the amphibious 
nature of the country between it and Lakes Maurepas and Pont- 
chartrain, and by two forts situated on either side of the river 
some distance below the city. The blockade was very difficult 
to enforce at this point, and this made the possession of New 
Orleans and the control of the lower Mississippi of very great 
importance to both combatants. Removing the guns and some 
of the stores of his larger ships, Farragut carried his fleet over 
the bar with the exception of the largest vessel. An ineffectual 
bombardment of the forts by a mortar flotilla only served to 
increase Farragut's determination. Running by the forts with 
his ships, he destroyed a Confederate naval force which had 
been hastily gathered to oppose him, and proceeding upwards 
anchored off New Orleans. The city was defenceless and sur- 
rendered, and the forts were abandoned soon after to the 
soldiers who co-operated with Farragut (April, 1862). The 
control of the lower Mississippi from the sea to Baton Rouge 
was now in the hands of the Union government. 

The battle of Mill Spring and the capture of Forts Henry 
and Donelson compelled the Confederates to 
Aprn'°862 abandon their first line of defence and fall back 

to their second line. This was along the Mem- 
phis and Charleston Railroad, which connected Memphis on 
the Mississippi with Chattanooga and Virginia by Knoxville, and 
South Carolina and Georgia by Atlanta. This railroad follows 
the valley of the Tennessee River from Florence to near Chat- 
tanooga. Above Florence and not far from the point where the 
river first runs due north is Pittsburg Landing near the little 



X.] The War in the West. 273 

church of Shiloh. About one-third of the distance from this 
point to the Mississippi, the Mobile and Ohio Railroad running 
north and south crosses the Memphis and Charleston — the 
town at their crossing bearing the classic name of Corinth. 
The important points in this defensive line were Chattanooga, 
Decatur, where the Memphis and Charleston crosses from the 
southern to the northern bank of the Tennessee, Pittsburg 
Landing, Corinth, and Memphis. Grant, proceeding south- 
ward from Fort Henry, ascended the Tennessee as far as Pitts- 
burg Landing and Shiloh, and there encamped until Buell should 
arrive with a strong reinforcement which Halleck, who then 
commanded in the department, had despatched from Nashville. 
On the morning of the day on which Buell arrived, the Con- 
federates under General Albert Sidney Johnston, one of the 
ablest soldiers of the war, suddenly attacked Grant's army, and 
drove it back towards the landing-place. Had almost any other 
man been in command, there would have been, in all likelihood, 
a terrible disaster. But Grant with a dogged stubbornness 
held on, until Buell 's arrival in the afternoon changed the 
whole aspect of affairs. The next day Grant attacked in his 
turn and forced back the Confederates, now commanded by 
Beauregard, owing to the death of Johnston (April, 1862). The 
two armies lost nearly twenty-three thousand men, killed, 
wounded, and missing in this sanguinary battle. Halleck then 
assumed command in the field, and with the united armies of 
Grant, Buell, and Pope captured Corinth (May, 1862) and 
Memphis (June, 1862). The Mississippi was now open from 
Cairo to below Memphis, and from the sea to above New 
Orleans. But the Confederate batteries on the bluffs at Vicks- 
burg closed the river to commerce. The President, who, under 
the Constitution, was the commander-in-chief of the forces 
of the United States, now summoned Halleck, whose strategic 
skill was supposed to have secured these results, to Wash- 
ington, to act as his chief-of-staff. 

C.A. 18 



2/4 The War for the Union. . [Chap. 

Throughout the autumn and winter (1861-62) the Con- 
, ^ federate and Union armies in Virsrinia had con- 

Plan of the ° 

Peninsular fronted each Other. It was March, 1862, before 

ampaign. McClellan could be induced to assume the 

offensive. He had then about one hundred and twenty 
thousand men to one-half that number of Confederates under 
Joseph E. Johnston. Instead of attacking him where he was, 
McClellan decided to transport his army by water to the Penin- 
sula which is formed by the York and James Rivers, and to 
approach Richmond from that direction. Several things made 
against the success of this scheme at the outset. In the 
first place, the civil authorities, feeling anxious for the safety 
of Washington, demanded that an adequate force should be 
placed in the Shenandoah Valley to face the Confederate army 
under Jackson in that region. Jackson on his part acted with 
so much vigour that he not merely kept this army in employ- 
ment, but so alarmed the chieftains at Washington that they 
retained near the Potomac McDowell and his corps of some 
forty thousand men who were to have marched overland to 
reinforce McClellan. In this way, Jackson with twenty-five 
thousand men diverted some seventy-five thousand from the 
real seat of war, and, when the time came, slipped away and 
joined his compatriots in front of Richmond. McClellan was 
disappointed also in not receiving the assistance Jie had 
expected from the navy. 

In point of fact, what with the blockade, the operations 
. ^ on the Mississippi, and the contest with the 

and the Merri- Merrimac , the navy had at this time about all it 
could attend to without succouring McClellan' s 
overwhelming force. The most formidable of the Confed- 
erate ironclads was the Merrimac or the Virginia as the 
Confederates rechristened her. This vessel was the old 
American frigate Merrimac which had been set on fire 
and sunk on the abandonment of the Norfolk navy-yard by 



X.] The Monitor and the Merrimac. 275 

the Union forces. The Confederates floated the vessel, cut her 
down, and built on her deck a superstructure of five-inch 
wrought iron resembling the roof of a house with the eaves 
under water. On March 8th, 1862, this strange craft steamed 
down to Hampton Roads, destroyed the United States frigates 
Cumberland and Congress, and began the destruction of the 
Minnesota. The next day she again appeared to complete 
the demolition of the Union fleet. But during the night 
an even stranger vessel had reached Fortress Monroe, the 
Union stronghold. This was the Monitor designed by John 
Ericsson, a naturalized citizen of the United States, and 
built under his supervision in one hundred days. Her ar- 
moured sides rose less than two feet above the water and on her 
deck, in a revolving iron turret, were two very large smooth-bore 
guns. The little ship appeared so grotesque in the eyes of 
sailors accustomed to the tall spars and graceful lines of f rigate.= 
like the Congress, that they dubbed her "a cheese-box on 
a raft" — a phrase which precisely described her appearance. 
Steaming alongside the huge Merrimac, the two armoured 
ships fought the first battle of its kind in the history of the 
world. In the course of four hours they threw at one another 
enough shot to have sunk the whole wooden navy of the United 
States. Not a shot penetrated the Monitor, and the damage 
sustained by the Merrimac is not known. The latter retired 
from the fight and never renewed it, while another combat 
would have been welcomed by the crew of the Monitor. 

McClellan's plans seem to have become known to the 
enemy within a few hours of their formation. 
Johnston immediately retired from his winter lar campaign^"' 
camp near the battle-field of Bull Run, and 
McClellan, when he began his march up the Peninsula, found 
himself stopped by a long line of entrenchments extending 
from Yorktown across the Peninsula to a branch of the James. 
It took him nearly a month to surmount this obstacle, and it 

J. 8— 2 



2/6 The War for the Union. [Chap. 

was the end of May before he reached the vicinity of Richmond. 
On May 31st (1862) a severe and indecisive battle was fought 
at Fair Oaks about ten miles from Richmond. A month 
later McClellan's picket line extended to within four miles of 
that city. Johnston was now wounded, and Robert E. Lee 
became the commander-in-chief of the Confederate army. 
Summoning Jackson from the Valley, he struck the Union 
army blow after blow (June 26 — July 2, 1862). These battles, 
known as the Seven Days, resulted in the withdrawal of the 
Army of the Potomac from the front of Richmond to the James 
below City Point. There, at Malvern Hill, it beat off a last 
attack with fearful damage to the assailants. The total loss 
in these engagements, from May 27 th, was forty-four thousand 
men, nearly equally divided between the two combatants. 
General Halleck was now in command of all the Northern 
forces, with headquarters at Washington. Aware 
Popes q£ Halleck's limitations, Lee determined to 

Campaign. ' 

relieve the pressure on Richmond by making a 
counter-demonstration against Washington, All the labours 
of the Army of the Potomac were lost. It was withdrawn from 
the James and sent to Acquia Creek to reinforce the army in 
front of Washington, now led by General Pope, the conqueror 
of Island No. 10. Lee on his interior lines reached Pope before 
McClellan's troops could be placed firmly in the former's grasp. 
Jackson, by one of his extraordinary marches, placed his corps 
on Pope's line of communication, and induced that astonished 
commander, who had begun the campaign by exhorting his 
soldiers to think no more of lines of retreat, to retire in some 
confusion. This enabled Lee to rejoin Jackson, to win the 
second battle of Bull Run (Aug. 29-30, 1862), and to force 
Pope back to the defences of Washington. 

Lee then crossed the Potomac near Harper's Ferry to release 
Maryland from the " invader," and to add that State to the ranks 
of secession. McClellan was restored to command, and the 



X.] Antietam and Fredericksburg. 277 

two armies fought a bloody battle on the banks of the Antietam 

(Sept. 17, 1862). The Union force was double 

that of the Confederates. But according to some .:, ^"'^•etam, 

o Sept. 1862. 

military critics, McClellan frittered away his 
opportunities in a series of sharp assaults. The next day Lee 
retired. The loss of the two armies in this battle was about 
twenty-two thousand, more than twelve thousand being on the 
Union side. McClellan, pursuing slowly, was relieved, and 
the command given to General Burnside. 

Lee, retreating southward to place himself between the two 
capitals, fortified Marye's Heights which rose „. ..„ 
just behind Fredericksburg on the Rappahan- of Fredericks- 
nock. Instead of manoeuvring Lee out of this ""^^^ 
very strong position, Burnside attacked it in front. It was diffi- 
cult to cross the river within range of riflemen posted in the 
houses of Fredericksburg, and the furious assaults of the federal 
troops on the entrenched line above the town were repulsed with 
great loss to the attacking parties. The " Horror of Fredericks- 
burg" (December 13, 1862) cost the Union army thirteen 
thousand men to only four thousand of the enemy, without any 
advantage being gained. Ere long, Burnside gave over the 
command to "Fighting Joe" Hooker, and the Army of the 
Potomac, worn down by fighting and with its discipline much 
impaired, went into winter-quarters at Falmouth opposite 
Fredericksburg. 

Not long after the beginning of the conflict (May 26, 1861), 
General B. F. Butler, commanding at Fortress ^^ ^ 

' ° The Emanci- 

Monroe, had refused to deliver up slaves who had pation Procia- 
escaped into his lines — they having been de- '"^*'°"- 
manded by their owner, a Confederate soldier, under the pro- 
visions of the Fugitive Slave Act. Butler declared that their 
labour would be useful to the enemy, and that he retained them 
as " contraband of war " ; and the name contraband clung to the 
slaves for the greater part of the war. Other commanders 



2/8 The War for the Ujiion. [Chap. 

went so far as to declare the slaves in their departments free. 
But this was going farther than Mr Lincoln then deemed 
prudent, and they were overruled. By the summer of 1862, 
the President's scruples seem to have been overcome by the 
logic of the situation. "My object," he wrote, " is to save the 
Union, and not either to save or destroy slavery. If I could 
save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it; if I 
could save it by freeing all the slaves, I would do it." He soon 
became convinced that to emancipate the slaves would be 
a useful and justifiable means of distressing the enemy and 
arousing sympathy for the Union cause abroad, as well as 
satisfying the demands of an influential body of his own 
supporters. Accordingly, after the collapse of Lee's invasion 
of Maryland, he issued a Proclamation (Sept. 22, 1862), stating 
that on the first day o£ the new year (1863) he would declare 
free all slaves in any portion of the country which should then 
be in rebellion against the United States; and on January i, 
1863, he issued the Emancipation Proclamation. This of 
course had effect only in such parts of the seceded States as 
were then or afterwards in the hands of the Union army. But 
it encouraged the active supporters of the war in the North, 
and did much to secure the sympathy of many English men 
and women. The Proclamation did not extend to the slave 
States which had not seceded. One of them, Maryland, adopted 
in 1864 a constitution without slavery — on the very day that 
Roger B. Taney, a citizen of that State and the author of 
the Dred Scott decision, died. The final blow was given to 
slavery throughout the country by the adoption in 1865 
of the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution,^ pro- 
hibiting slavery in any part of the United States. 

When Halleck left the West to assume the direction of the 
war at Washington, the fine army which he had led to Corinth 
was divided among three commanders, Grant, Rosecrans, and 

1 See Appendix V. 



\ 



X.] The Emancipation Proclamation. 279 

Buell. The two first named were to complete the conquest 
of the country bordering on the Mississippi, 
and Buell was ordered to seize Chattanooga fo^Tennessee^ 
and drive the Confederates from eastern Ten- 
nessee. Meantime, the vigour and foresight of the Confed- 
erate General, Braxton Bragg, had changed the face of the war. 
Placing thirty thousand men on the railway cars, he carried 
them to Mobile and thence to Chattanooga. He thus reached 
that field of action earlier than Buell, who was seriously ham- 
pered by instructions from the far-off Halleck. Bragg next 
eluded Buell, and marched to the vicinity of Louisville on the 
Ohio before he could be brought to action. But at Perryville 
(Oct. 8, 1862) the two armies fought a stubborn battle in 
which either side lost about five thousand men. Bragg, 
however, was forced to return to Chattanooga. Buell, on his 
part, halted at Nashville, where he was relieved by Rosecrans. 

In November, Bragg again moved northward and advanced 
as far as Murfreesboro', on the road to Nashville. 
On December 30th, Rosecrans moved out of Murfreesboro'. 
Nashville with the Army of the Cumberland and 
advanced southward to gain Chattanooga. The two armies 
met at Stone River near Murfreesboro' on the last day of the 
year (Dec. 31, 1862). Again and again Bragg hurled his 
splendid army against the Union position. The centre under 
Thomas and Sheridan stood firm and repelled every attack. The 
next day the two combatants faced one another, and on Jan. 2 
(1863), Bragg retired from the field. In this terrible conflict 
the two armies lost some twenty-two thousand men out of 
ninety thousand engaged. Rosecrans remained in and near 
Murfreesboro' for nearly six months until June, 1863. We 
must now return to the Mississippi. 

When Bragg moved northwards in the summer of 1862, he 
had ordered Price and Van Dorn to attack the Union forces 
and prevent reinforcements being sent to Buell. The carrying 



28o The War for the Union. [Chap. 

out of these orders brought on the battles of luka (Sept. 19, 
TheVicks- 1862) and Corinth (Oct. 3, 4, 1862). Soon 
burg Cam- after, Rosccrans left for the Cumberland, and 

paign. Grant exercised sole command in Mississippi. 

The eastern bank of the river of that name is marked by a 
succession of high bluffs which in some places border the 
stream and in others retire to a distance from it. At Memphis, 
for example, the bluffs leave the river's bank and retire far 
inland, again approaching the river at Vicksburg. The inter- 
vening space is occupied by a morass, through which the 
Yazoo sluggishly meanders, emptying into the Mississippi 
a little to the north of Vicksburg. That place had by this 
time become a formidable stronghold, unassailable from the 
river. The gun-boats were useless, as the fortress was so 
high above the stream that the guns of the ironclads could 
scarcely reach the top, while the vessels were exposed to a very 
destructive cannonade. Farragut had run by this citadel four 
times, but had been able to do little towards its capture. Grant 
now took the matter in hand. The best plan would have been 
to advance southward from Corinth and to approach Vicksburg 
from the north and east. Unfortunately, Grant was not given 
a free hand. The machinations of the "political generals " and 
the politicians demanded an advance down the Mississippi. 
Dividing his force into two parts, he sent Sherman with one 
portion down the Mississippi to assail Vicksburg from that 
direction, and with the remainder of the army he marched 
southward to prevent Pemberton, the new Confederate com- 
mander in that quarter, from opposing Sherman. A sudden 
raid by the Confederates destroyed his stores at Holly Springs 
(Dec. 1862) and he was obliged to fall back. Pemberton was 
thus free to turn on Sherman, and the latter was repulsed with 
heavy loss in an attack on Haines' Bluff a few miles north-east 
of Vicksburg (Dec. 29, 1862). As an offset to this failure, 
Sherman and Porter, acting under the nominal command of 



X.] Vicksburg. 281 

McClernand, captured Arkansas Post (Jan. 11, 1863), a strong 
position on the Arkansas River, the garrison of which might 
have seriously threatened Grant in his later campaign. Grant 
now transferred his whole command to the Mississippi above 
Vicksburg and tried plan after plan without success. Finally, 
passing by Vicksburg on the west side of the Mississippi, 
he crossed the river below the town, gained the rear, and, 
after a sharp action or two (April and May, 1863), drove 
Pemberton's forces into the fortifications and besieged them 
there, his right resting on the river north of the town and near 
the scene of Sherman's recent failure. Meantime, General 
Joseph E. Johnston, recovered from his wound, had been placed 
in command of the Confederate forces in Mississippi. He had 
ordered Pemberton to save his army while an opening still 
remained. But Pemberton had refused to obey Johnston's 
command. Consequently, all the latter could do was to 
threaten the rear of the besieging army. To meet this danger. 
Grant detailed Sherman with thirty thousand men; but beyond 
causing the federal commanders some anxiety and diverting 
Sherman's corps from the direct work of the siege, Johnston 
accomplished nothing. The siege went on, and after repelling 
several assaults, the garrison of Vicksburg, thirty thousand 
strong, surrendered to the Union army on the 4th of July, 1863. 
A few weeks later the other Confederate strongholds on the 
great river fell into Union hands, and the Mississippi, in 
Lincoln' s words, " flowed unvexed to the sea. " The day before 
the fall of Vicksburg the Army of the Potomac had repelled 
the last attack of Lee's army on the lines at Gettysburg. 

General Hooker^ the new commander of the Army of the 
Potomac, was" at once a popular ofiEicer and 
a strict disciplinarian. Under his care the viiie.^"" 
army soon recovered its morale, and on April 
30th, 1863, resumed its arduous task. Leaving Sedgwick with 
one corps to seize Marye's Heights, if occasion should offer, 



282 The War for the Union. [Chap. 

Hooker turned Lee's left flank and placed his main army, 
about eighty thousand strong, across the Rappahannock in 
and around Chancellorsville and then stopped. Lee, leaving a 
small force to confront Sedgwick, divided the remainder of his 
army — about one-half the size of Hooker's • — into two parts. 
With one portion Jackson made a rapid march across the 
front of the Union army, surprised Hooker's right and all but 
routed it. This was Jackson's last fight, as he was accidentally 
shot by his own men, while returning from a reconnoissance. 
Redoubling his attacks, the next day Lee forced Hooker back 
to the river. Then turning on Sedgwick, who had meantime 
captured Marye's Heights, he drove him across the river. In 
these four days (May 2-5, 1863) the Union army had lost 
seventeen thousand men to thirteen thousand of the Con- 
federates; and Lee, with an army of fifty-eight thousand men, 
had inflicted a crushing defeat on the Army of the Potomac, 
one hundred and twenty-five thousand strong, and the Con- 
federates still occupied Marye's Heights. 

Lee, however, was not the man to remain quiet in his lines. 

Again assuming the offensive, he led his army 
Pe^nVwanfa through the Valley and, crossing the Potomac, 

invaded Pennsylvania. The Army of the Poto- 
mac followed, and on June 28th received a new commander, 
General George G. Meade, a quiet business-like man, but a 
safe and thorough soldier. 

The advance of this army in his rear forced Lee to turn 

back, and, in a race for the roads leading 
Gettysburg, southward, the foremost divisions of the two 

July 1-3, 1863. ' 

armies encountered each other near the little 
village of Gettysburg (July ist, 1863). The Union soldiers 
were driven back through the town, and found themselves on 
a crest called Cemetery Ridge. This position offered such 
advantages to the defenders that Meade determined to fight 
a general battle at that point. The ridge occupied by the 



X.] Gettysburg. 283 

Union army at Gettysburg has been well described as in 
the form of a gigantic fish-hook. Gulp's Hill on the extreme 
point formed the right of the Union position, and the hills 
called the Round Tops, at the end of the shank, guarded its 
left. The Gonf ederates drew up their forces on Seminary Ridge, 
opposite and parallel to Gemetery Ridge, their left extending 
through the town to the front of Gulp's Hill, around whose base 
ran a little stream. On July 2nd the Gonfederates drove back 
a body of troops which had been wrongly advanced beyond the 
left of the Union line; they also effected a lodgment on the 
slope of Gulp's Hill. From this latter position they were 
driven on the morning of the 3rd, and all attempts on their 
part to gain more ground on the Union left failed completely. 
Lee then essayed to break the Union centre. Led on by the 
gallant Pickett, fifteen thousand Gonfederate soldiers charged 
the Union line, to be hurled back with fearful slaughter. 
That ended the battle, and soon after Lee retreated across 
the Potomac. In this momentous conflict, the Union army 
numbered eighty thousand men and lost twenty- three thousand; 
the Gonfederate force amounted to seventy thousand and lost 
twenty-five thousand. Gettysburg and Vicksburg decided the 
war. The North had shown its power to repel invasion and 
had cut the Gonfederacy in twain. 

After the battle of Stone River, Rosecrans rested his army 
for nearly six months, from January to June, ^^. , 
1863. The authorities at Washington then in- and chat- 
duced him to move, and he began anew his ^"°°sa- 
attempt to manoeuvre Bragg out of Ghattanooga. In this he 
succeeded. By this time, however, the campaign had been 
fought in the East and Lee found himself able to send Long- 
street with his corps to Bragg's assistance. The Union forces 
in the West were at the same time increased by the arrival 
of Burnside, with a new Army of the Ohio, who occupied 
Knoxville. Feinting, as if to join Burnside, Rosecrans crossed 



284 The War for the Union. [Chap. 

the Tennessee below Chattanooga, and obliged Bragg to 
abandon that town. Before Rosecrans could get his whole 
army in hand again, Bragg attacked him near Chickamauga 
Creek (Sept. 19 and 20, 1863), and had not Thomas, who 
commanded the Union centre, stood firm, the Union army 
would have suffered a terrible defeat. Soon afterwards Thomas 
succeeded Rosecrans in the command of the Army of the 
Cumberland and was blockaded by Bragg in Chattanooga. 
Longstreet, on his part, besieged Burnside at Knoxville. It 
seemed probable that both Union armies would be starved 
into surrender, or at least into leaving their positions. It was 
at this time that Grant assumed command of all the armies 
from Knoxville to Vicksburg. Hooker, with reinforcements 
from the Army of the Potomac, had already reached Chat- 
tanooga, and Grant brought Sherman's corps with him. 
Throwing Hooker's corps at Bragg' s left, Grant confided to 
Sherman the task of destroying Bragg' s right flank, while 
he himself with Thomas and the Army of the Cumberland 
pressed the Confederates in front. Sherman, at his end of the 
line, was brought to a standstill by an unsuspected ravine 
which suddenly opened across his path — but not until he had 
dealt the Confederate right a severe blow. Hooker carried 
his corps up the sides of Lookout Mountain, fought a romantic 
"Battle above the Clouds," and then gained a position on 
Bragg' s left and rear. Thomas now attacked the main position 
in front. His attack was not intended to be a serious affair 
but merely to occupy the attention of the main body of the 
Confederates while Sherman and Hooker gained their flanks 
and rear. But the Army of the Cumberland, as if jealous 
of the confidence reposed in the new-comers, without orders, 
and against orders, carried the first line of the Confederate 
entrenchments, pressed on with the flying enemy, pursued 
them up the slope of Missionary Ridge, rushed over the 
entrenchments, and broke the centre of the Confederate army. 



X.] Chattanooga. 285 

Bragg retreated in haste toward Atlanta. These three battles 
are conveniently known as the Battle of Chattanooga (Nov. 
23-25, 1863). Sherman at once went to the relief of Burnside, 
and on his approach Longstreet retired to Virginia. Vicksburg 
and Chattanooga made Grant the foremost soldier in the Union 
army. Furthermore, he had won the confidence of the people 
of the North. On March loth, 1864, he was placed in com- 
mand of all the armies. For the remainder of the war, the 
several Union armies acted in concert. Grant conducted the 
Virginia campaigns in person, and confided the control of 
the armies operating from Chattanooga to his able and trusted 
lieutenant, William T. Sherman. It will be convenient to 
follow the movements of these latter armies first. 

General Sherman had about one hundred thousand men, 
for the most part inured to war, commanded 
by able chiefs, Thomas, McPherson, Schofield, johnstTrT" ^""^ 
Ord, Sheridan, and Hooker, and united by a 
feeling of confidence in one another from the commanding 
general down to the drummer boy. Opposed to this splendid 
force were some seventy-five thousand veterans led by General 
Joseph E. Johnston, a general second only to Lee in ability 
among the living Confederate officers. The Confederate 
government, however, did not place the fullest confidence in 
Johnston, and his subordinates did not always support him 
as they should have done. The country between Chattanooga 
and Atlanta is very broken and rugged, offering an admirable 
defensive position every few miles of the way. 

The Atlanta campaign is most interesting from the strate- 
gical point of view. Instead of attacking 
Johnston in front, Sherman only threatened to ca^patgn^"*^ 
do so, at the same time passing strong bodies 
of troops around his right or left flank. As soon as this 
movement became serious, Johnston would retire to a new 
set of entrenchments which had been constructed by negro 



286 The War for the Union. [Chap. 

slaves a few miles in the rear. There was but one serious 
assault during the whole campaign from the Tennessee to the 
Chattahoochee, about one hundred miles in a straight line, 
but the fighting was almost continuous (May 7 — July 9, 1864). 
The Union loss was about sixteen thousand to thirteen thousand 
for the Confederates. Soon the Chattahoochee, the last natural 
obstacle in the way, was passed and the Confederate army alone 
remained between Sherman and the most important military 
factories in the South. Many of these had been constructed 
since the beginning of the war, and others had been adapted 
from other uses to those of war. The loss of Atlanta would 
be an irreparable blow to the South. Johnston was now re- 
moved from the command of the defence, and Hood, one of 
his subordinates, was put in his place. It was believed that 
Hood would fight, and in this expectation the Confederate 
government was fully justified. On July 19, he attacked the 
Union army as it was changing its position, and was repulsed 
with a loss of five thousand to two thousand for Sherman. 
Regardless of this attack, the latter general continued the 
movement of his army, and Hood again attacked (July 22) 
and was again repelled. Unable to seize Atlanta from the 
south-east, Sherman passed his army around to the west and 
south. While this new movement was in progress. Hood 
attacked Sherman with great fury on July 28, and again on 
September ist. Repelled, with great loss, Hood on September 
2nd retired from Atlanta to save his army, and marching west- 
ward and then northward, endeavoured to make Sherman aban- 
don Atlanta by attacking his communications with the North. 
The latter general now surprised Hood by sending back Thomas 
and Schofield with some fifty thousand men, including the gar- 
risons on the lines of communication as far as Nashville, while 
with another sixty thousand men, stripped of all impedimenta, 
and hardened to marching and fighting, he left Atlanta — after 
destroying the mills and factories — and set out for the sea-coast. 



X.] Atlanta and Nashville. 287 

At first sight this plan of the "March to the Sea," which 
had been long in Sherman's mind, seemed 
likely to end in disaster. But neither Sher- campaign 
man, who proposed the scheme, nor Grant, 
who sanctioned its being carried into effect, were men to 
engage in foolhardy enterprises. Of the importance of the 
movement there could be little question. The Union com- 
manders believed the Confederacy to be on the point of col- 
lapse from sheer exhaustion. The spectacle of sixty thousand 
men marching hither and yon through the heart of the Con- 
federacy would raise the spirits of the Unionists and depress 
those of the Confederates. It might also have an important 
effect on European opinion. A further march from the coast 
northward would necessitate the evacuation of the sea-ports 
then remaining in the hands of the Confederates, and would 
place Sherman and his army within supporting distance of 
Grant and the Army of the Potomac. Nor did the risk seem 
great. Sherman believed that he would be superior to any 
force in the Confederacy except the armies commanded by 
Lee and Hood. The serious questions to be considered were 
the ability of Thomas to crush Hood, and of Grant to prevent 
Lee from sending reinforcements to either Hood or any force 
which might gather on Sherman's path. Grant had abundant 
force and will to keep Lee fully employed. As to Thomas, 
there was more doubt. The movement, however, might seri- 
ously impair the fighting strength of the Confederates, and 
Grant consented to it. 

Thomas carried out the task intrusted to him in his usual 
quiet and thorough way. Retiring to Nashville, ^^ 
the better to rally to his aid the different bodies Victory at 
of troops scattered throughout Tennessee and to 
receive recruits from the North, Thomas refused to be hurried 
into action. He would cheerfully hand over the command to 
another, but he would not give battle until he was ready. At 



288 The War for the Union. [Chap. 

length on December 15th, 1864, Thomas left his entrenchments 
and attacked Hood. In the course of that day and the next 
he not merely routed the Confederates, but destroyed Hood's 
army as a military organization. 

Meantime Sherman was gaily "marching through Georgia " 

— cutting a swathe sixty miles wide as he went. 
to the Sea/^ When they came across a railroad the soldiers, 

inany of whom were railroad builders, became 
railroad destroyers, and they did their work so thoroughly that 
the gaps they cut in the railroad system of the South could not 
be repaired during the war. The army lived on the country 
and lived well — but in other respects private property was not 
destroyed. On December loth, Sherman opened communi- 
cations with the squadron blockading Savannah, and ten days 
later entered that city, which was evacuated by the enemy. 
Resting his men for about a month, Sherman set out before he 
was expected to start and thus gained a position in front of the 
troops who should have opposed his march. Directing his 
course inland, he made the evacuation of Charleston necessary, 
and reached Columbia, the capital of the State of South 
Carolina, on February 17th, 1865. Lee, now that the danger 
was so great, took the responsibility of appointing Joseph 
E. Johnston to command whatever troops could be gathered 
to oppose Sherman. The march now became more difficult 
and vastly more dangerous the nearer Sherman approached 
Lee's army. The rivers, swollen with the winter's rains, de- 
tained Sherman. Johnston exerted all his energy and talent. 
At Bentonville, in North Carolina, he attacked the head of 
Sherman's army, and for a time it seemed as if there would be 
a disaster. In the end Johnston was beaten off with heavy 
loss, and Sherman reached Goldsboro' in safety. There he was 
joined by Terry and his corps, who had recently captured Wil- 
mington, the last refuge of the blockade-runners. There, also, 
Schofield joined him with a portion of the army with which 



X.] Grant and Lee. 289 

Thomas had beaten Hood. Sherman was now (March 21st, 
1865) superior to Johnston's forces or to any army which could 
be brought against him. He held fast to Johnston, while Grant 
completed the ruin of Lee's army. 

On May 3rd, 1864, the day that Sherman left Chattanooga, 
the Army of the Potomac under Grant, with Thewude 
Meade in immediate command, crossed the ness to Coid 
Rapidan southward for the last time. The 
Union force amounted to one hundred and twenty thousand 
men, while Lee had sixty-two thousand. Two days later, 
while passing through the Wilderness, the opposing armies 
came together not far from the fatal field of Chancellorsville. 
For four days (May 5-9, 1864) a terrible contest went on; 
and, then, Grant, unable to push Lee back, moved to the left 
and gained Spottsylvania Court House. There another fearful 
conflict ensued (May 10-12) and with the same result as 
before. Again by the left, Grant directed his army and came 
upon Lee in an unassailable position on the North Anna — 
a branch of the Pamunkey River. Another flank march 
brought the Union soldiers to Cold Harbor, about thirteen 
miles from Richmond, and to the battle ground of McClellan's 
Peninsular campaign. There again Lee confronted them. 
Grant hurled the Army of the Potomac at Lee's veterans and it 
was repulsed with awful loss. For nearly two weeks (May 31 
— June 12, 1864) there was continuous fighting at this point, 
when Grant, changing his base, transferred his army by the 
left to Petersburg about twenty miles south of Richmond. 
Lee again anticipated him, and Grant began the siege or 
blockade of Petersburg, which continued through the autumn 
and winter and into the spring of 1865. \n these battles 
from the Rapidan to the James, Grant suffered a loss of sixty 
thousand men without inflicting proportionate injury on Lee. 
But Grant's losses could be and were made good, while 
every Confederate killed or captured was an irreparable 
C. A. 19 



290 The War for the Union. [Chap. 

loss to Lee. Grant refused to allow any more exchanges of 
prisoners, declaring that a man who died in the Confederate 
prisons died for the cause of the Union equally with the man 
who died on the field of battle. During the winter Grant tried 
to get around both to the right and to the left of Lee, but 
accomplished little except the destruction of one of the two 
railroads over which Lee's scanty supplies must come, and the 
extension of the Union left necessitated the extension of the 
Confederate right until the defensive works stretched in a long 
line of thirty-seven miles. 

Lee endeavoured to secure Grant's withdrawal by a raid 
Sheridan's agaiust the Union capital. Led by Jubal Early, 
Valley Cam- a body of Confederate troops marched down 
^^*^"' the Shenandoah Valley, crossed the Potomac, 

and reached the defences of Washington. But the clerks in 
the departments and a few hastily summoned troops detained 
Early long enough to enable two army corps to reach the city 
by water from the James. Early then retreated to the Valley. 
Without letting go his hold on Petersburg, Grant detached 
Sheridan with an army of forty thousand men — including ten 
thousand cavalry — to destroy Early's force, if possible, and to 
devastate the Valley so that another Confederate army could 
not march through it. Then ensued a series of marchings 
and counter-marchings, to which the topography of the Valley 
was most favourable. The alternate advance and retreat of 
the Confederates depended mainly upon the number of men 
Lee could send to Early or might be obliged to withdraw 
from him. Ultimately, Sheridan over-mastered Early, and, 
having devastated the Valley, returned to the main army 
(Nov. 1864). 

In the autumn of this year the people of the North by re- 
electing Lincoln, decided, that the war should 

Lincoln & ' 5 

re-elected go ou. Johu C. Fremont was the first candidate 

resi ent. ^^ ^^ nominated for the presidency. The nomi- 



X.] The Last Campaigns. 291 

nation was made by a radical group, which demanded a more 
vigorous prosecution of the war. The Democrats nominated 
General McClellan on a platform which declared that the war 
was a failure. McClellan somewhat damped the ardour of 
his supporters by declaring in his letter of acceptance that the 
war had been successfully prosecuted. Fremont retired in 
favour of Lincoln, who was re-elected by a popular majority 
of nearly half a million, receiving two hundred and twelve 
electoral votes to twenty-one given to McClellan. Preparations 
for bringing the conflict to a close were now pushed forward 
with great vigour, and the Union army increased in size every 
month until May 1865, when over one million men were on 
the Northern muster rolls. No such increase in numbers was 
possible for the South. Even the losses could not be made 
good. The only hope remaining was for Lee and Johnston 
to escape to the mountains, and there to maintain a partisan 
warfare. 

In the spring, even before the roads became really passable, 
Grant was up and doing. He had one hundred „. „ 

■^ ° The Surrender 

and twenty-five thousand men to Lee's fifty at Appomattox 
thousand. He again extended his line to the 
left, and Sheridan, who led the turning force, gained a 
position at Five Forks (April ist, 1865) commanding the 
roads to the rear of Richmond and Petersburg, and Lee could 
not drive him back. On the night of April 2nd and 3rd, 
Lee withdrew his army from his works and endeavoured to 
escape by the valley of the Appomattox to the foot-hills of the 
Alleghanies. While the main Army of the Potomac hung on 
his flank and rear, Sheridan, with his cavalry and an infantry 
corps, pushed to the front. By a misunderstanding, the 
supplies designed for Lee's soldiers were sent to Richmond. 
This necessitated a delay to enable the men to procure what- 
ever food there was in the vicinity. The supplies obtained 
were scanty enough, and the delay was fatal. When (April 7th, 

19—2 



292 The War for the Union. [Chap. 

1865) the starving Army of Northern Virginia reached the 
vicinity of Appomattox Court House, a body of dismounted 
Union cavalry was descried drawn up across the line of retreat. 
Lee deployed his men, when the cavalry drawing off disclosed 
an infantry line of battle. Sheridan's cavalry and the Fifth 
Corps were in front of Lee's veterans ; the main body of the 
Army of the Potomac was pressing them from behind. There 
was nothing left but surrender. The terms granted to these 
soldiers, and later to Johnston's men, were such as had never 
before been granted to the vanquished at the end of a great 
civil war. They required that the Confederate soldiers should 
lay down their arms and cease from hostilities ■ — nothing more. 
Grant even did what he could to repair the exhaustion of the 
South, by allowing the men who had horses to retain them : 
"They will need them for the spring ploughing." An en- 
deavour was later made to bring to account the politicians who 
had led the secession. But the attempt was wisely abandoned. 

The surrender at Appomattox was on April 9th, 1865. 
Five days later, on Good Friday, April 14th, 
murdered. 1 865, Abraham Lincoln was murdered by a 

demented sympathizer with the cause of dis- 
union. Thus perished the one man able and willing to restrain 
the Northern extremists. The "reconstruction" of the Union 
fell into less capable hands, and many of the later woes of the 
South may be regarded as in part due to this most unholy 
of murders. But our story ends here. It remains only to call 
the reader's attention to a few of the underlying causes for the 
long duration of the conflict and for the final triumph of the 
North. 

The inhabitants of the States remaining in the Union 
-, ,, outnumbered the inhabitants of the seceding 

iNortnern '-' 

and Southern States, more than two to one. The Union 

armies outnumbered the Confederate armies 

throughout the war, although the disproportion became more 



X.] The North and the South. 293 

marked after 1863. Why then, on the one hand, was not 
the South crushed, at the outset? On the other hand, how 
did it happen that it was ultimately beaten? In the first 
place, it must be conceded that the Southern leaders made 
a better use of their resources — bearing in mind the immediate 
object in view — than the leaders of the Northern people. 
The whole Southern population was utilized for war purposes. 
Everything else was abandoned. The able-bodied men went 
to the front, the old, the young, and the infirm remained 
behind with the women and the slaves. The old men and the 
women superintended the work of the plantation. The pro- 
ductive forces of the South were thus utilized until near the 
close of the conflict with very slight assistance from the able- 
bodied adult males. These were thus free to become soldiers, 
and were forced into the army by the Confederate government 
with a ruthless hand. In the North the case was very different. 
The Union leaders, perhaps because they under-estimated the 
resistance the Southern people would make, or perhaps because 
they realized that the war would be long and costly, built up 
the industries of the North on the one hand, while they fought 
the South on the other. A protective tariff stimulated manu- 
facturing, a liberal policy as to the national domain aided the 
settlement of the western States and territories, which was 
further encouraged by the building of long lines of railroads 
opening up new regions to settlement. The productive 
capacities of the North were in these ways enormously 
increased and expanded during the war. The North grew 
stronger in material resources every year, and every year there- 
fore there was a greater fund from which to draw revenue for 
the support of the war. This great expansion in industry, 
however, demanded the labour of a very large proportion 
of the adult male population and thus prevented the Union 
leaders from making an unrestricted use of their resources in 
the way of men fit for service in the army. These facts alone, 



294 The War for the Unio7i. [Chap. 

had other things been equal, would have accounted for the 
prolongation of the struggle and for the eventual collapse 
of the South. 

The Union government, while developing the resources 
The South ^^ ^^^ ^^^^"^ people, seriously crippled those of 
during the the secessionists. This was accomplished by 

the blockading of the Southern ports. The 
blockade was begun in April 1861, and continued with ever- 
increasing severity to the close of the war. The naval blockade, 
moreover, was supplemented by an equally rigorous land 
blockade. Of course, there was a movement of goods in and 
out of the Confederacy. Specially constructed vessels ran the 
blockade of the seaports, at very great risk to themselves, and 
merchandise of one kind or another, was smuggled across the 
land frontier. But these were as driblets to the natural stream 
of commerce. The effectiveness of the blockade can be dis- 
covered from the fact that the exports of cotton fell from 
over two hundred million dollars' worth in i860 to four million 
dollars worth in 1863. Practically, the commercial life of the 
Confederacy was brought to a complete cessation. Had the 
North been thus closed to the outer world it would have made 
little difference. That section contained in full operation all 
the elements of social organization of the nineteenth century. 
The South did not. Cotton was its staple, and the inability 
freely to export that commodity deprived the South of the 
means of civilized existence. The capital of the South con- 
sisted in land and slaves. As the cultivation of cotton gradually 
ceased, the production of food-stuffs increased. But there 
existed no means of replacing the material of war as it was 
destroyed. The blockade-runners brought in scant supplies 
of arms and munitions; but towards the end this source of 
supply was destroyed, and it was proposed to arm at least one 
regiment with pikes. But when one looks beyond the bare 
necessaries of existence and warfare, and has regard for such 



X.] The North and the South. 295 

necessities of civilization as boots and clothing and paper, 
one finds that the South was fairly denuded of these things in 
1865. The sufferings of the soldiers were greatly increased by 
the gradual collapse of the Confederate government's credit. 
There was comparatively little business transacted in the 
South, and the government, unable to raise much by taxation, 
carried on the contest by credit, and that was so little regarded 
that the Confederate paper money was practically valueless 
in 1864-65. It took, for instance, five hundred dollars to buy 
a pair of boots. The blockade by land and sea, in short, 
contributed more than any other single thing to the destruction 
of the Confederacy. 

The fact that the Confederate government was a despotism 
from the beginning to the end of its brief life 
contributed largely to the early and energetic Hmitati"n"s"°"^' 
use of the resources of the South. There was, 
indeed, a Confederate Constitution, and Jefferson Davis was 
elected President. There was also all the paraphernalia 
of a constitutional government in the shape of a congress 
and great departments, each with its chief. In reality, how- 
ever, Davis wielded the powers of a despot; and, considering 
the task in hand, used his power with skill and vigour. 
The Union government, on the other hand, was sorely 
hampered by the necessity of consulting the susceptibilities 
of the people and of many of the State governments. It 
was hampered at the outset by the necessity of observing 
the Habeas Corpus Act and other constitutional safeguards. 
Throughout the war a large party among the people of the 
North opposed its acts, while the South was substantially 
unanimous in support of the Confederate government, at least 
until the autumn of 1864. 

Although it is true that Southern armies occasionally 
invaded the North, only to meet with repulse, the war was, 
on the part of the South, defensive in the main. Defensive 



296 The War for the Union. [Chap. 

warfare in itself is easier than offensive warfare, and in this 
instance the topography of the South greatly 
the^trugg1e.° assisted the defenders. The natural obstructions 
presented by the large and numerous rivers 
flowing eastward and westward from the Alleghany Mountains 
were formidable. Moreover, the paucity of artificial means of 
transport, such as railroads, and the insufficiency of the country 
roads, impeded the march of the well-supplied Union armies 
to a much greater extent than they did the progress of the 
Southern soldiers, who, as a rule, were seldom troubled with 
much equipment or food. The Union soldiers were probably 
better fed, clothed, and cared for than any army had been 
before i860. Their very wealth, however, hindered their 
movements, and it was not until the Atlanta campaign that 
the two armies faced one another on anything like an equal 
footing in this respect. In that campaign, General Sherman 
reduced the impedimenta of his army to the lowest possible 
point consistent with continued efficiency. It should be noted, 
however, that the federal leaders utilized to advantage the 
railways existing in the South and also made great use of the 
more important navigable streams. Without these means of 
communication the conquest of the South might have been 
impossible. 

It must be conceded also that the Southerner was a better 
., , soldier in the besrinning of a term of service than 

Northern . 

and Southern the Northerner. The habits and associations of 
armies. ^j^^ people of the North were peaceful. The 

fields, shops, and professional offices of that section gave full 
opportunities to the young Northerner to display his energies. 
The army and the navy of the United States were largely 
officered by Southerners, to whom the conditions of life in the 
South offered few inducements to remain at home. Most 
of these men "followed their States" in place of observing 
their oaths of allegiance to the United States. There were 



X.] The North and the South. 297 

many exceptions to this rule, and some of the most dis- 
tinguished Union leaders, Farragut and Thomas, for instance, 
were Southern men. Besides, most of the Northern men who 
had been educated at West Point had left the army after their 
obligations to the government had been fulfilled, and had 
entered civil pursuits. McClellan, for example, was president 
of a railroad, Grant was engaged in business, and Sherman was 
teaching school. It took time for these men to gain the 
positions to which their talents fitted them. Indeed, in some 
cases, as in that of Sherman, their knowledge of the probable 
requirements of the war led them to make such large demands 
for men, that civilian officers, ignorant of the problem, were 
given the preference. The '' poor white " of the South, too, 
submitted more readily to discipline at the hands of the 
Southern aristocrats, than did the Northern labourer or clerk 
to the orders and admonitions of his military superior, who 
may well have been his fellow clerk or labourer a week or a 
month before. When drilled and hardened to war by con- 
tinued service, the Northern volunteer proved to be as good a 
soldier as any. 

The Southern military organization was more permanent 
than was that of the North. Lee became the ,, ,. . ,^ 

Robert E. 

head of the army defending Richmond in the Lee and Gen- 
summer of 1862, and led it to victory and defeat ^^^ ^^^ ^°"' 
until the close of the war in April, 1865. The Army of the 
Potomac was led by six men in rapid succession until May, 
1863, when Meade assumed command. Robert E. Lee was 
the ablest soldier of the war. Indeed he takes high rank 
among the foremost military leaders of modern times. His 
ablest subordinate was "Stonewall" Jackson, who had no 
equal in executing orders in either army. The Confederates 
in the East, therefore, had the advantage in position, in organi- 
zation, and in leadership. This was not the case in the West, 
at least not to anything like the same extent. 



298 The War for the Union. [Chap. 

Albert Sidney Johnston, the ablest Confederate commander 
in the West, was killed at Shiloh, in 1862. The 
the West^' '" *-''^^y Other man who seemed to be able to cope 
with Grant, Sherman, Thomas, or Sheridan, was 
Joseph E. Johnston; but he held no important command in 
the West until the Atlanta campaign, and he was removed from 
his place at the head of the defending army at the moment 
when his policy might have borne important fruit. To these 
facts, and to the nature of the country, which was more 
practicable for the invader, may be ascribed the successes of 
the Union armies in the West. 

In the closing chapter of his interesting sketch of the Civil 
War, Colonel Dodge gives some statistics, from 
the^War!"^^ ° which it is fouud that the Union soldiers were 
always more numerous than the Confederate 
soldiers. On July ist, 1861, the Union armies contained 
one hundred and eighty-six thousand soldiers to some one 
hundred and fifty thousand in the Confederate armies. The 
highest number credited to the latter belligerent is six hundred 
and ninety thousand in June 1863, at which time the Union 
soldiers numbered nine hundred and eighteen thousand. From 
that time, the inequality steadily increased. In January 1864, 
the Union soldiers outnumbered their opponents two to one; 
at the beginning of 1865, the proportion was four to one. 
On March 31st, 1865, ten days before Lee's surrender, the 
Union soldiers numbered nine hundred and eighty thousand 
to one hundred and seventy-five thousand on the Confederate 
rolls. The Union soldiers, therefore, always outnumbered the 
Confederates. But this numerical preponderance was often 
more apparent than real. The Union soldiers performed many 
services, which in the Southern armies were done by slaves — 
such as constructing defensive works. Bearing this in mind it 
would not be far from the truth to say that in the earlier years 
of the war, the number of soldiers actually equipped and ready 



X.] Results of the War. 299 

to take their places in the fighting line was about the same on 
both sides. Even when this was not the case, the Confederates 
were able, by means of their shorter interior lines, to reinforce 
their armies at the most threatened points with greater ease 
and speed than their opponents, to which end their superior 
marching qualities also contributed. It was not until 1864 
that the Union forces were really superior in numbers at all 
points. The sacrifices of the soldiers in the contending armies 
were enormous. Some figures have been already given. It 
may be well to add that about ninety-five thousand Union 
soldiers were killed or fatally wounded on the field of battle. 
One hundred and eighty thousand more succumbed to disease 
while on the army rolls. Adding to these all those who died 
from accident, or disappeared permanently, or died within a 
short time from wounds received in action, or from disease 
contracted while in the service, Colonel Dodge thinks that 
about half a million men were lost to the North and as many 
more to the South. The war, therefore, cost the American 
people the lives of one million men. These men perished in 
no less than two thousand four hundred actions which were of 
sufificient importance to receive names. The total cost of the 
war to the Union government was about three and one-half 
thousand millions of dollars — not including expenses incurred 
by the separate States or municipalities. From this estimate, 
too, payments for pensions, which are now being made at the 
rate of one hundred and fifty million dollars each year, are also 
excluded. Taking everything into consideration, the war for 
the Union cost the nation not less than ten thousand million 
dollars (two thousand million pounds sterling). 

In the preceding pages we have seen how sixteen hundred 
thousand colonists living on the Atlantic seaboard of North 
America developed into a great nation stretching from the 
Atlantic to the Pacific. In the beginning many things made 



300 The War for the Union. [Chap, x.] 

against the establishment of a national government; the diver- 
gent interests of the several sections and the genius of the people 
were opposed to consolidation. Federation bridged over this 
difficulty for a time; but the necessities of the case demanded 
a stronger organization, and in 1789 a government partly 
federal and partly national was substituted for the weak Con- 
federation. A great change in economic conditions fastened 
the institution of slavery on the South at the time that slavery 
was disappearing in the North. The country was thus divided 
into two sections whose social and business interests were 
irreconcilable. The weaker section appealed to the old prin- 
ciples of federation pure and simple and repudiated the idea of 
nationality. The Civil War settled these two questions of 
slavery and nationality in favour of the North. The old issues 
on which political parties formed and fought disappeared in 
1865. United under a government which had withstood the 
shock of this great conflict, the American people, with a hope- 
fulness born of past successes and with a buoyancy peculiar 
to itself, looked forward to the solution of whatever problems 
the future might have in store. 



MAP III . TO ILLUSTRATE CHAPTER X . 




(hnihn'dge Uhiver.iit}- H-ess . 



APPENDIX. 



THE VIRGINIA RESOLVES, 1769. 

Resolves of the House of Burgesses, passed the 1 6th of May, 
1769. 

i^ESOlbcB, Nemine ) That the sole right of imposing taxes on the 

Contradicente, \ inhabitants of this His Majesty's Colony 

and Dominion of Virginia is now, and ever hath been, legally 
and constitutionally vested in the House of Burgesses, law- 
fully convened, according to the ancient and established 
practice, with the consent of the Council, and of His JMajesty, 
the King of Great Britain, or his Governor for the time being. 

2^JSohj£ti, nemine contradtcettte, That it is the undoubted privilege 
of the inhabitants of this colony to petition their Sovereign 
for redress of grievances ; and that it is lawful and expedient 
to procure the concurrence of His Majesty's other colonies, 
in dutiful addresses, praying the royal interposition in favour 
of the violated rights of America. 

i^csolbeU, nemine cotitradicente, That all trials for treason, mis- 
prision of treason, or for any felony or crime whatsoever, 
committed and done in this His Majesty's said colony and 
dominion, by any person or persons residing therein, ought of 
right to be had, and conducted in and before His Majesty's 
courts, held within his said colony, according to the fixed and 
known course of proceeding ; and that the seizing any person 
or persons residing in the colony, suspected of any crime 
whatsoever, committed therein, and sending such person or 
persons to places beyond the sea to be tried, is highly de- 
rogatory of the rights of British subjects, as thereby the 
inestimable privilege of being tried by a jury from the 
301 



302 Appendix. 

vicinage, as well as the liberty of summoning and producing 
witnesses on such trial, will be taken away from the party 
accused. 

J^JSDltrclJ, netiiine contradkeiite, That an humble, dutiful and loyal 
address be presented to His Majesty, to assure him of our 
inviolable attachment to his sacred person and government ; 
and to beseech his royal interposition, as the father of all his 
people, however remote from the seat of his empire, to quiet 
the minds of his loyal subjects of this colony, and to avert 
from them those dangers and miseries which will ensue, from 
the seizing and carrying beyond sea any person residing in 
America, suspected of any crime whatsoever, to be tried in 
any other manner than by the ancient and long established 
course of proceeding. 
[The following order is likewise in their journal of that date.] 

Ordered, That the speaker of this House do transmit, without 
delay, to the speakers of the several houses of Assembly on 
this continent, a copy of the resolutions now agreed to by this 
House, requesting their concurrence therein. 



11. 
THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE. 

(^Adopted by the Continental Congress, July ^tk, 1776.) 

En CiSW^Ja^SS, 3ul2 A, 1776. Wc^t unanimnus tteclaratton of 
if)E tfjirtffn tmitfir S^tatES of America. 

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary 
for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected 
them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, 
the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of 
Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of 
mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel 
them to the separation. 

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created 
equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain un- 



Appendix. 303 

alienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and tire pursuit 
of Happiness. That to secure these rights. Governments are in- 
stituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent 
of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes 
destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or 
to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its founda- 
tion on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, 
as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and 
Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long 
established should not be changed for light and transient causes ; 
and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are 
more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufFerable, than to right 
themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. 
But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing in- 
variably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under 
absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off 
such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future 
security. Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies ; 
and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their 
former Systems of Government. The history of the present King 
of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all 
having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny 
over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a 
candid world. 

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and 
necessary for the public good. 

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and 
pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his 
Assent should be obtained ; and when so suspended, he has utterly 
neglected to attend to them. 

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of 
large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the 
right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to 
them and formidable to tyrants only. 

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, 
uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public 
Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance 
with his measures. 



304 Appendix. 

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing 
with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people. 

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause 
others to be elected ; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of 
Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise ; 
the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers 
of invasion from without, and convulsions within. 

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States ; 
for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreign- 
ers ; refusing to pass others to encourage their migration hither, 
and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands. 

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing 
his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers. 

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure 
of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries. 

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither 
swarms of Officers to harass our people, and eat out their sub- 
stance. 

He has kept among us, in times of peace. Standing Armies 
without the Consent of our legislatures. 

He has affected to render the Military independent of and 
superior to the Civil power. 

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction 
foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws ; 
giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation : 

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us : 

For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment, for 
any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of 
these States : 

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world : 

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent : 

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by 
Jury : 

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended 
offences : 

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbour- 
ing Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and 
enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example 



Appendix. 305 

and fit instniment for introducing the same absolute rule into these 
Colonies : 

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, 
and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments : 

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves 
invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever. 

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his 
Protection and waging War against us. 

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, 
and destroyed the lives of our people. 

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Merce- 
naries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already 
begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in 
the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civil- 
ized nation. 

He ■ has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the 
high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the execu- 
tioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their 
Hands. 

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has en- 
deavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless 
Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished 
destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions. 

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for 
Redress in the most humble terms : Our repeated Petitions have 
been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character 
is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to 
be the ruler of a free people. 

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. 
We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legis- 
lature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have 
reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settle- 
ment here. We have appealed to their native justice and magna- 
nimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common 
kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably inter- 
rupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been 
deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, there- 
fore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, 

C. A. 20 



306 Appendix. 

and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, 
in Peace Friends. 

Wa, i\\ixtivit, the Representatives of the unitetr States of ^imr= 
ica, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme 
Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the 
Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, 
solemnly publish and declare. That these United Colonies are, 
and of Right ought to be Sxtt anlJ EnUrptnticnt States ; that they are 
Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all 
political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, 
is and ought to be totally dissolved ; and that as Free and Inde- 
pendent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, 
contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts 
and Things which Independent States may of right do. And 
for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the pro- 
tection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our 
Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor. 

JOHN HANCOCK. 

1 \_N'ew H amp shir e.'\ 
JosiAH Bartlett, William Williams, 



William Whipple, 
Matthew Thornton. 

\_Massachicsetts Bay.'] 
Samuel Adams, 



Oliver Wolcott. 

{Mew York.'] 
William Floyd, 



John Adams, Ph^^^p Livingston, 

Robert Treat Paine, Francis Lewis, 

Elbridge Gerry. Lewis Morris. 

{Rhode Island.-] [New Jersey.] 

Stephen Hopkins, 

William Ellery. Richard Stockton, 

John Witherspoon, 

{Connecticut.] Francis Hopkinson, 

Roger Sherman, John Hart, 

Samuel Huntington, Abraham Clark. 

^ This arrangement of the names is made for convenience. The States 
are not mentioned in the original. 



Appendix. 



307 



{^Pennsylvania. '\ 

Robert Morris, 
Benjamin Rush, 
Benjamin Franklin, 
John Morton, 
George Clymer, 
James Smith, 
George Taylor, 
James Wilson, 
George Ross. 

\Pela'ware.'\ 

CiESAR Rodney, 
George Read, 
Thomas M'Kean. 

\Marylandr\ 

Samuel Chase, 
William Paca, 
Thomas Stone, 
Charles Carroll of 
Carrollton. 



{Virginia. '\ 
George Wythe, 
Richard Henry Lee, 
Thomas Jefferson, 
Benjamin Harrison, 
Thomas Nelson, Jr., 
Francis Lightfoot Lee, 
Carter Braxton. 

{North Carolina. 1 
William Hooper, 
Joseph Hewes, 
John Penn. 

{South Carolina.'] 
Edward Rutledge, 
Thomas Heyward, Jr., 
Thomas Lynch, Jr., 
Arthur Middleton. 

{Georgia.] 
Button Gwinnett, 
Lyman Hall, 
Geo. Walton. 



III. 

ARTICLES OF CONFEDERATION.! 

{Adopted by Congress, July <^th, iTjZ^ 

^0 all to amijom 

these Presents shall come, we the undersigned Delegates of the 
States affixed to our Names send greeting. Whereas the Delegates 
of the United States of America in Congress assembled did on the 
fifteenth day of November in the Year of Our Lord One thousand 

1 From American History Leaflets, No. 20. 

20 — 2 



308 Appendix. 

seven Hundred and Seventy seven, and in the second Year of the 
Independence of America agree to certain articles of Confedera- 
tion anti perpetual Union between the States of Newhampshire, 
Massachusetts-bay, Rhodeisland and Providence Plantations, Con- 
necticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Mary- 
land, Virginia, North-Carolina, South-Carolina, and Georgia, in 
the Words following, viz. " Articles of Confederation and 
perpetual Union between the States of Newhampshire, Massa- 
chusetts-bay, Rhodeisland and Providence Plantations, Connecti- 
cut, New-York, New-Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, 
Virginia, North-Carolina, South-Carolina, and Georgia." 

Article I. The Stile of this confederacy shall be "The 
United States of America." 

Article II. Each state retains its sovereignty, freedom and 
independence, and every Power, Jurisdiction and right, which is 
not by this confederation expressly delegated to the United States, 
in Congress assembled. 

Article III. The said states hereby severally enter into a 
firm league of friendship with each other, for their common de- 
fence, the security of their Liberties, and their mutual and general 
welfare, binding themselves to assist each other, against all force 
oifered to, or attacks made upon them, or any of them, on account 
of religion, sovereignty, trade, or any other pretence whatever. 

Article IV. The better to secure and perpetuate mutual 
friendship and intercourse among the people of the different states 
in this union, the free inhabitants of each of these states, paupers, 
vagabonds, and fugitives from Justice excepted, shall be entitled 
to all privileges and immunities of free citizens in the several 
states ; and the people of each state shall have free ingress and 
regress to and from any other state, and shall enjoy therein all 
the privileges of trade and commerce, subject to the same duties, 
impositions and restrictions as the inhabitants thereof respectively, 
provided that such restriction shall not extend so far as to prevent 
the removal of property imported into any state, to any other state 
of which the Owner is an inhabitant ; provided also that no impo- 
sition, duties or restriction shall be laid by any state, on the property 
of the united states, or either of them. 

If any Person be guilty of, or charged with treason felony. 



Appendix. 309 

or other high misdemeanor in any state, shall flee from Justice, 
and be found in any of the united states, he shall upon demand of 
the Governor or executive power, of the state from which he fled, 
be delivered up and removed to the state having jurisdiction of his 
offence. 

Full faith and credit shall be given in each of these states to 
the records, acts and judicial proceedings of the courts and magis- 
trates of every other state. 

Article V. For the more convenient management of the 
general interest of the united states, delegates shall be annually 
appointed in such manner as the legislature of each state shall 
direct, to meet in Congress on the first Monday in November, in 
every year, with a power reserved to each state, to recal its dele- 
gates, or any of them, at any time within the year, and to send 
others in their stead, for the remainder of the Year. 

No state shall be represented in Congress by less than two, nor 
by more than seven Members ; and no person shall be capable of 
being a delegate for more than three years in any term of six years ; 
nor shall any person, being a delegate, be capable of holding any 
office under the united states, for which he, or another for his bene- 
fit receives any salary, fees or emolument of any kind. 

Each state shall maintain its own delegates in a meeting of the 
states, and while they act as members of the committee of the states. 

In determining questions in the united states, in Congress 
assembled, each state shall have one vote. 

Freedom of speech and debate in congress shall not be im- 
peached or questioned in any Court, or place out of Congress, and 
the members of Congress shall be protected in their persons from 
arrests and imprisonments, during the time of their going to and 
from, and attendance on congress, except for treason, felony, or 
breach of the peace. 

Article VI. No state without the Consent of the united 
states in congress assembled, shall send any embassy to, or receive 
any embassy from, or enter into any conference, agreement, alliance 
or treaty with any King prince or state ; nor shall any person hold- 
ing any office of profit or trust under the united states, or any of 
them, accept of any present, emolument, office or title of any kind 
whatever from any king, prince or foreign state ; nor shall the 



3 lo Appendix. 

united states in congress assembled, or any of them, grant any title 
of nobility. 

No two or more states shall enter into any treaty, confedera- 
tion or alliance whatever between them, without the consent of the 
united states in congress assembled, specifying accurately the pur- 
pose for which the same is to be entered into, and how long it 
shall continue. 

No state shall lay any imposts or duties, which may interfere 
with any stipulations in treaties, entered into by the united states 
in congress assembled, with any king, prince or state, in pursuance 
of any treaties already proposed by congress, to the courts of France 
and Spain. 

No vessels of war shall be kept up in time of peace by any 
state, except such number only, as shall be deemed necessary by 
the united states in congress assembled, for the defence of such 
state, or its trade ; nor shall any body of forces be kept up by any 
state, in time of peace, except such number onl}-, as in the judg- 
ment of the united states, in congress assembled, shall be deemed 
requisite to garrison the forts necessary for the defence of such 
state ; but every state shall always keep up a well regulated and dis- 
ciplined militia, sufficiently armed and accoutred, and shall provide 
and constantly have ready for use, in public stores, a due number of 
field pieces and tents, and a proper quantity of arms, ammunition 
and camp equipage. 

No state shall engage in any war without the consent of the 
united states in congress assembled, unless such state be actually 
invaded by enemies, or shall have received certain advice of a 
resolution being formed by some nation of Indians to invade such 
state, and the danger is so immanent as not to admit of a delay, till 
the united states in congress assembled can be consulted : nor 
shall any state grant commissions to any ships or vessels of war, 
nor letters of marque or reprisal, except it be after a declaration 
of war by the united states in congress assembled, and then only 
against the kingdom or state and the subjects thereof, against 
which war has been so declared, and under such regulations as 
shall be established by the united states in congress assembled, 
unless such state be infested by pirates, in which case vessels of 
war may be fitted out for that occasion, and kept so long as the 



Appendix. 311 

danger shall continue, or until the united states in congress as- 
sembled shall determine otherwise. 

Article VII. When land-forces are raised by any state for 
the common defence, all officers of or under the rank of colonel, 
shall be appointed by the legislature of each state respectively by 
whom such forces shall be raised, or in such manner as such state 
shall direct, and all vacancies shall be filled up by the state which 
first made the appointment. 

Article VIII. All charges of war, and all other expences 
that shall be incurred for the common defence or general welfare, 
and allowed by the united states in congress assembled, shall be 
defrayed out of a common treasury, which shall be supplied by 
the several states, in proportion to the value of all land within 
each state, granted to or surveyed for any Person, as such land 
and the buildings and improvements thereon shall be estimated 
according to such mode as the united states in congress assembled, 
shall from time to time, direct and appoint. The taxes for paying 
that proportion shall be laid and levied by the authority and direc- 
tion of the legislatures of the several states within the time agreed 
upon by the united states in congress assembled. 

Article IX. The united states in congress assembled, shall 
have the sole and exclusive right and power of determining on 
peace and war, except in the cases mentioned in the sixth article — 
of sending and receiving ambassadors — entering into treaties and 
alliances, provided that no treaty of commerce shall be made 
whereby the legislative power of the respective states shall be 
restrained from imposing such imposts and duties on foreigners, 
as their own people are subjected to, or from prohibiting the ex- 
portation or importation of any species of goods or commodities 
whatsoever — of establishing rules for deciding in all cases, what 
captures on land or water shall be legal, and in what manner prizes 
taken by land or naval forces in the service of the united states 
shall be divided or appropriated — of granting letters of marque 
and reprisal in times of peace — appointing courts for the trial of 
piracies and felonies committed on the high seas and establishing 
courts for receiving and determining finally appeals in all cases of 
captures, provided that no member of congress shall be appointed 
a judge of any of the said courts. 



312 Appendix. 

The united states in congress assembled shall also be the last 
resort on appeal in all disputes and differences now subsisting or 
that hereafter may arise between two or more states concerning 
boundary, jurisdiction or any other cause whatever ; which author- 
ity shall always be exercised in the manner following. Whenever 
the legislative or executive authority or lawful agent of any state 
in controversy with another shall present a petition to congress, 
stating the matter in question and praying for a hearing, notice 
thereof shall be given by order of congress to the legislative or 
executive authority of the other state in controversy, and a day 
assigned for the appearance of the parties by their lawful agents, 
who shall then be directed to appoint by joint consent, commis- 
sioners or judges to constitute a court for hearing and determining 
the matter in question : but if they cannot agree, congress shall 
name three persons out of each of the united states, and from the 
list of such persons each party shall alternately strike out one, 
the petitioners beginning, until the number shall be reduced to 
thirteen ; and from that number not less than seven, nor more 
than nine names as congress shall direct, shall in the presence of 
congress be drawn out by lot, and the persons whose names shall 
be so drawn or any five of them, shall be commissioners or judges, 
to hear and finally determine the controversy, so always as a 
major part of the judges who shall hear the cause shall agree in 
the determination : and if either party shall neglect to attend at 
the day appointed, without shewing reasons, which congress shall 
judge sufficient, or being present shall refuse to strike, the congress 
shall proceed to nominate three persons out of each state, and 
the secretary of congress shall strike in behalf of such party absent 
or refusing ; and the judgment and sentence of the court to be 
appointed, in the manner before prescribed, shall be final and 
conclusive ; and if any of the parties shall refuse to submit to 
the authority of such court, or to appear or defend their claim 
or cause, the court shall nevertheless proceed to pronounce sen- 
tence, or judgment, which shall in like manner be final and deci- 
sive, the judgment or sentence and other proceedings being in 
either case transmitted to congress, and lodged among the acts 
of congress for the security of the parties concerned : provided 
that every commissioner, before he sits in judgment, shall take an 



Appendix. 3 1 3 

oath to be administered by one of the judges of the supreme or 
superior court of the state, where the cause shall be tried, " well 
and truly to hear and determine the matter in question, according 
to the best of his judgment, without favour, affection or hope of 
reward : " provided also that no state shall be deprived of territory 
for the benefit of the united states. 

All controversies concerning "the private right of soil claimed 
under different grants of two or more states, whose jurisdictions 
as they may respect such lands, and the states which passed such 
grants are adjusted, the said grants or either of them being at the 
same time claimed to have originated antecedent to such settle- 
ment of jurisdiction, shall on the petition of either party to the 
congress of the united states, be finally determined as near as may 
be in the same manner as is before prescribed for deciding disputes 
respecting territorial jurisdiction between different states. 

The united states in congress assembled shall also have the 
sole and exclusive right and power of regulating the alloy and 
value of coin struck by their own authority, or by that of the 
respective states — fixing the standard of weights and measures 
throughout the United States — regulating the trade and manage- 
ing all affairs with the Indians, not members of any of the states, 
provided that the legislative right of any state within its own 
limits be not infringed or violated — establishing and regulating 
post-offices from one state to another, throughout all the united 
states, and exacting such postage on the papers passing thro' the 
same as may be requisite to defray the expences of the said office 
— appointing all officers of the land forces, in the service of the 
united states, excepting regimental officers — appointing all the 
officers of the naval forces, and commissioning all officers what- 
ever in the service of the united states — making rules for the gov- 
ernment and regulation of the said land and naval forces, and 
directing their operations. 

The united states in congress assembled shall have authority 
to appoint a committee, to sit in the recess of congress, to be 
denominated " A Committee of the States," and to consist of one 
delegate from each state ; and to appoint such other committees 
and civil officers as may be necessary for manageing the general 
affairs of the united states under their direction — to appoint one 



314 Appendix. 

of their number to preside, provided that no person be allowed 
to serve in the office of president more than one year in any term 
of three years ; to ascertain the necessary sums of Money to be 
raised for the service of the united states, and to appropriate and 
apply the same for defraying the public expences — to borrow 
money, or emit bills on the credit of the united states, transmitting 
every half year to the respective states an account of the sums 
of money so borrowed or emitted, — to build and equip a navy — 
to agree upon the number of land forces, and to make requisitions 
from each state for its quota, in proportion to the number of white 
inhabitants in such state ; which requisition shall be binding, and 
thereupon the legislature of each state shall appoint the regimental 
officers, raise the men and cloath, arm and equip them in a soldier 
like manner, at the expence of the united states ; and the officers 
and men so cloathed, armed and equipped shall march to the 
place appointed, and within the time agreed on by the united 
states in congress assembled : But if the united states in congress 
assembled shall, on consideration of circumstances judge proper 
that any state should not raise men, or should raise a smaller 
number than its quota, and that any other state should raise a 
greater number of men than the quota thereof, such extra number 
shall be raised, officered, cloathed, armed and equipped in the 
same manner as the quota of such state, unless the legislature of 
such state shall judge that such extra number cannot be safely 
spared out of the same, in which case they shall raise, officer, 
cloath, arm and equip as many of such extra number as they judge 
can be safely spared. And the officers and men so cloathed, 
armed and equipped, shall march to the place appointed, and 
within the time agreed on by the united states in congress as- 
sembled. 

The united states in congress assembled shall never engage in 
a war, nor grant letters of marque and reprisal in time of peace, 
nor enter into any treaties or alliances, nor coin money, nor 
regulate the value thereof, nor ascertain the sums and expences 
necessary for the defence and welfare of the united states, or any 
of them, nor emit bills, nor borrow money on the credit of the 
united states, nor appropriate money, nor agree upon the number 
of vessels of war, to be built or purchased, or the number of land 



Appendix. 315 

or sea forces to be raised, nor appoint a commander in chief of 
the army or navy, unless nine states assent to the same : nor shall 
a question on any other point, except for adjourning from day to 
day be determined, unless by the votes of a majority of the united 
states in congress assembled. 

The congress of the united states shall have power to adjourn 
to any time within the year, and to any place within the united 
states, so that no period of adjournment be for a longer duration 
than the space of six months, and shall publish the Journal of their 
proceedings monthly, except such parts thereof relating to treaties, 
alliances or military operations, as in their judgment require secrecy ; 
and the yeas and nays of the delegates of each state on any question 
shall be entered on the Journal, when it is desired by any delegate ; 
and the delegates of a state, or any of them, at his or their request 
shall be furnished with a transcript of the said Journal, except such 
parts as are above excepted, to lay before the legislatures of the sev- 
eral states. 

Article X. The committee of the states, or any nine of them, 
shall be authorized to execute, in the recess of congress, such of the 
powers of congress as the united states in congress assembled, by 
the consent of nine states, shall from time to time think expedient 
to vest them with ; provided that no power be delegated to the said 
committee, for the exercise of which, by the articles of confedera- 
tion, the voice of nine states in the congress of the united states 
assembled is requisite. 

Article XI. Canada acceding to this confederation, and join- 
ing in the measures of the united states, shall be admitted into, and 
entitled to all the advantages of this union : but no other colony shall 
be admitted into the same, unless such admission be agreed to by 
nine states. 

Article XII. All bills of credit emitted, monies borrowed and 
debts contracted by, or under the authority of congress, before the 
assembling of the united states, in pursuance of the present confed- 
eration, shall be deemed and considered as a charge against the 
united states, for payment and satisfaction whereof the said united 
states, and the public faith are hereby solemnly pledged. 

Article XIII. Every state shall abide by the determinations of 
the united states in congress assembled, on all questions which by 



3 1 6 Appendix. 

this confederation are submitted to them. And tlie Articles of this 
confederation shall be inviolably observed by every state, and the 
union shall be perpetual ; nor shall any alteration at any time here- 
after be made in any of them ; unless such alteration be agreed to in 
a congress of the united states, and be afterwards confirmed by the 
legislatures of every state. 

'EnB SSEtjErcas it has pleased the Great Governor of the World 
to incline the hearts of the legislatures vv^e respectively represent in 
congress, to approve of, and to authorize us to ratify the said articles 
of confederation and perpetual union, know ye that we the under- 
signed delegates, by virtue of the power and authority to us given 
for that purpose, do by these presents, in the name and in behalf of 
our respective constituents, fully and entirely ratify and confirm each 
and every of the said articles of confederation and perpetual union, 
and all and singular the matters and things therein contained : And 
we do further solemnly plight and engage the faith of our respective 
constituents, that tliey shall abide by the determinations of the united 
states in congress assembled, on all questions, which by the said 
confederation are submitted to them. And that the articles thereof 
shall be inviolably observed by the states we respectively represent, 
and that the union shall be perpetual. In v^^itness whereof we have 
hereunto set our hands in Congress. Done at Philadelphia in the 
state of Pennsylvania the ninth Day of July in the Year of our Lord 
one Thousand seven Hundred and Seventy eight, and in the third 
year of the independence of America. 



/-, ii i Q u T. ir f f Thos M. Kean Feb. I2. 1779 

On the part & behalf of j y , y-,. , . ^^r „,, v_L« 

the State of Delaware \ ^""^^ Dickinson, May 5th 1779 
tne state ot Delaware y Nicholas VanDyke, 

On the part and behalf of f John Hanson March ist 1781 
the State of Maryland \ Daniel Carroll. do. 

(Richard Henry Lee 
ihomas Adams 
Jno Harvie 
Francis Lightfoot Lee 

On the nart and Behalf of f J°^" ^^^^ J^^'^ ^'^* ^^78 
.V c.^. At ^1 \ Corns Harnett 

the State of No. Carolma | j Williams 



Appendix. 



317 



On the part and behalf of 
the State of South-Caro- 
lina 



On the part and behalf of 
the State of Georgia 

On the part & behalf of 
the State of New Hamp- 
shire 



On the part and behalf of 
the State of Massachu- 
setts Bay 



On the part and behalf of 
the State of Rhode- 
Island and Providence 
Plantations 



On the Part and behalf of 
the State of Connecti- 
cut 



On the Part and Behalf of 

the State of New York 

On the Part and in Behalf 
of the State of New 
Jersey. Novr. 26, 1778 

On the part and behalf of 
the State of Pennsyl- 
vania 



Henry Laurens 
William Henry Drayton 
Jno. Mathews 
Richd. Hudson 
Thos. Heyward Junr. 

■Jno Walton 24th July 1778 
Edwd. Telfair 
Edwd. Langworthy. 

' Josiah Bartlett, 

John Wentworth Junr August 8th 
1778 

John Hancock. 
Samuel Adams 
Elbridge Gerry. 

i Frances Dana 
James Lovell 
Samuel Holten. 

" William Ellery 
Henry Marchant 
John Collins 

'Roger Sherman 

Samuel Huntington 

Oliver Wolcott 

Titus Hosmer 
^Andrew Stearns 

rjas. Duane. 
I Eras. Lewis 
I Wm Duer. 
IGouv. Morris, 

Jno Witherspoon 
Nath. Scudder 

■ Robt Morris. 

Daniel Roberdeau 

Jon. Bayard Smith 

William Clingan 
^Joseph Reed, 22nd July 1778 



- Mamiscript Rollin the Library of the Departvient 
of State. 



3 1 8 Appendix. 

March i, 1781. THE CONFEDERATION COMPLETED. 

According to the order of the day the Hon''''' John Hanson and 
Daniel Carroll two of the delegates for the State of Maryland in 
pursuance of the act of the legislature of that state entitled " An 
Act to empower the delegates of this state in Congress to sub- 
scribe and ratify the Articles of Confederation " which was read 
ia Congress the 12 of February last and a copy thereof entered 
on the minutes did in behalf of the said state of Maryland sign 
and ratify the said articles, by which act the Confederation of the 
United States of America was compleated, each and every of the 
thirteen united states from Newhampshire to Georgia both included 
having adopted and confirmed and by their delegates in Congress 
ratified the same. — Manuscript Journal of Congress, Vol. 30. 



IV. 

CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES WITH 
THE AMENDMENTS.! 

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more 
perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquihty, 
provide for the common defence, promote the general Wel- 
fare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our 
Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the 
United States of America. 

ARTICLE. I. 

Section, i. All legislative Powers herein granted shall be 
vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of 
a Senate and House of Representatives. 

Section. 2. The House of Representatives shall be composed 
of Members chosen every second Year by the People of the several 

1 Reprinted from the American History Leaflets, No. 8, published by A. 
Lovell and Co., New York. 



Appendix. 319 

States, and the Electors in each State shall have the Qualifications 
requisite for Electors of the most numerous Branch of the State 
Legislature. 

No Person shall be a Representative who shall not have attained 
to the Age of twenty five Years, and been seven Years a Citizen of 
the United States, and who shall not, when elected, be an Inhabitant 
of that State in which he shall be chosen. 

Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among 
the several States which may be included within this Union, accord- 
ing to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by add- 
ing to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to 
Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three 
fifths of all other Persons. The actual Enumeration shall be made 
within three Years after the first Meeting of the Congress of the 
United States, and within every subsequent Term of ten Years, in 
such Manner as they shall by Law direct. The Number of Repre- 
sentatives shall not exceed one for every thirty Thousand, but 
each State shall have at Least one Representative ; and until such 
enumeration shall be made, the State of New Hampshire shall be 
entitled to chuse three, Massachusetts eight, Rhode-Island and 
Providence Plantations one, Connecticut five, New-York six. New 
Jersey four, Pennsylvania eight, Delaware one, Maryland six, Vir- 
ginia ten. North Carolina five. South Carolina five, and Georgia 
three. 

When vacancies happen in the Representation from any State, 
the Executive Authority thereof shall issue Writs of Election to 
fill such Vacancies. 

The House of Representatives shall chuse their Speaker and 
other Officers ; and shall have the sole Power of Impeachment. 

Section. 3. The Senate of the United States shall be com- 
posed of two Senators from each State, chosen by the Legislature 
thereof, for six Years ; and each Senator shall have one Vote. 

Immediately after they shall be assembled in Consequence of 
the first Election, they shall be divided as equally as may be into 
three Classes. The Seats of the Senators of the first Class shall 
be vacated at the Expiration of the second Year, of the second 
Class at the Expiration of the fourth Year, and of the third Class 
at the Expiration of the sixth Year, so that one third may be 



320 Appendix. 

chosen every second Year ; and if Vacancies happen by Resigna- 
tion, or otherwise, during the Recess of the Legislature of any 
State, the Executive thereof may make temporary Appointments 
until the next Meeting of the Legislature, which shall then fill such 
Vacancies. 

No Person shall be a Senator who shall not have attained to the 
Age of thirty Years, and been nine Years a Citizen of the United 
States, and who shall not, when elected, be an Inhabitant of that 
State for which he shall be chosen. 

The Vice President of the United States shall be President 
of the Senate, but shall have no Vote, unless they be equally 
divided. 

The Senate shall chuse their other Officers, and also a President 
pro tempore, in the Absence of the Vice President, or when he 
shall exercise the Office of President of the United States. 

The Senate shall have the sole Power to try all Impeachments. 
When sitting for that Purpose, they shall be on Oath or Affirma- 
tion. When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief 
Justice shall preside : And no Person shall be convicted without the 
Concurrence of two thirds of the Members present. 

Judgment in Cases of Impeachment shall not extend further 
than to removal from Office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy 
any Office of honor. Trust or Profit under the United States : 
but the Party convicted shall nevertheless be liable and subject 
to Indictment, Trial, Judgment and Punishment, according to 
Law. 

Section. 4. The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elec- 
tions for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each 
State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any 
time by Law make or alter such Regulations, except as to the 
Places of chusing Senators. 

The Congress shall assemble at least once in every Year, and 
such Meeting shall be on the first Monday in December, unless 
they shall by Law appoint a different Day. 

Section. 5. Each house shall be the Judge of the Elections, 
Returns and Qualifications of its own Members, and a Majority 
of each shall constitute a Quorum to do Business ; but a smaller 
Number may adjourn from day to day, and may be authorized to 



Appendix. 321 

compel the Attendance of absent Members, in such Manner, and 
under such Penalties as each House may provide. 

Each House may determine the Rules of its Proceedings, punish 
its Members for disorderly Behaviour, and, with the Concurrence of 
two thirds, expel a Member. 

Each House shall keep a Journal of its Proceedings, and from 
time to time publish the same, excepting such Parts as may in their 
Judgment require Secrecy ; and the Yeas and ISTays of the Members 
of either House on any question shall, at the Desire of one fifth of 
those Present, be entered on the Journal. 

Neither House, during the Session of Congress, shall, without 
the Consent of the other, adjourn for more than three days, nor 
to any other Place than that in which the two Houses shall be 
sitting. 

Section. 6. The Senators and Representatives shall receive a 
Compensation for their Services, to be ascertained by Law, and 
paid out of the Treasury of the United States. They shall in 
all Cases, except Treason, Felony and Breach of the Peace, be 
privileged from Arrest during their Attendance at the Session 
of their respective Houses, and in going to and returning from the 
same ; and for any Speech or Debate in either House, they shall 
not be questioned in any other Place. 

No Senator or Representative shall, during the Time for which 
he was elected, be appointed to any civil Office under the 
Authority of the United States, which shall have been created, 
or the Emoluments whereof shall have been encreased during 
such time ; and no Person holding any Office under the United 
States, shall be a Member of either House during his Continuance 
in Office. 

Section. 7. All Bills for raising Revenue shall originate in the 
House of Representatives ; but the Senate may propose or concur 
with Amendments as on other Bills. 

Every Bill which shall have passed the House of Represen- 
tatives and the Senate, shall, before it become a Law, be presented 
to the President of the United States ; If he approve he shall 
sign it, but if not he shall return it, with his Objections to that 
House in which it shall have originated, who shall enter the 
Objections at large on their Journal, and proceed to reconsider 

C. A. 2 1 



322 Appendix. 

it. If after such Reconsideration two thirds of that House shall 
agree to pass the Bill, it shall be sent, together with the Objections, 
to the other House, by which it shall likewise be reconsidered, and 
if approved by two thirds of that House, it shall become a Law. 
But in all such Cases the Votes of both Houses shall be deter- 
mined by Yeas and Nays, and the Names of the Persons voting 
for and against the Bill shall be entered on the Journal of each 
House respectively.. If any Bill shall not be returned by the 
President within ten Days (Sundays excepted) after it shall have 
been presented to him, the same shall be a Law, in like Manner 
as if he had signed it, unless the Congress by their Adjournment 
prevent its Return, in which Case it shall not be a Law. 

Every Order, Resolution, or Vote to which the Concurrence 
of the Senate and House of Representatives may be necessary 
(except on a question of Adjournment) shall be presented to the 
President of the United States ; and before the same shall take 
Eifect, shall be approved by him, or being disapproved by him, 
shall be repassed by two thirds of the Senate and House of Repre- 
sentatives, according to the Rules and Limitations prescribed in 
the Case of a Bill. 

Section. 8. The Congress shall have Power To lay and 
collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and 
provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the 
United States ; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uni- 
form throughout the United States ; 

To borrow Money on the credit of the United States ; 

To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the 
several States, and with the Indian Tribes ; 

To establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization, and uniform 
Laws on the subject of Bankruptcies throughout the United States ; 

To coin Money, regulate the Value thereof, and of foreign Coin, 
and fix the Standard of Weights and Measures ; 

To provide for the Punishment of, counterfeiting the Securities 
and current Coin of the United States ; 

To establish Post Offices and post Roads ; 

To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by secur- 
ing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right 
to their respective Writings and Discoveries ; 



Appendix. 323 

To constitute Tribunals inferior to the supreme Court ; 
' To define and punish Piracies and Felonies committed on the 
high Seas, and Oifences against the Law of Nations ; 

To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and 
make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water ; 

To raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money to 
that Use shall be for a longer term than two Years ; 

To provide and maintain a Navy ; 

To make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land 
and naval Forces ; 

To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of 
the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions ; 

To provide for organising, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, 
and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the 
Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, 
the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the 
Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress ; 

To exercise exclusive Legislation in all Cases whatsoever, over 
such District (not exceeding ten Miles square) as may, by Cession 
of particular States, and the Acceptance of Congress, become the 
Seat of the Government of the United States, and to exercise like 
Authority over all Places purchased by the Consent of the Legis- 
lature of the State in which the same shall be, for the Erection of 
Forts, Magazines, Arsenals, dock-Yards, and other needful Build- 
ings ; — And 

To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for 
carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers 
vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, 
or in any Department or Officer thereof. 

Section. 9. The Migration or Importation of such Persons 
as any of the States now existing shall think proper to admit, 
shall not be prohibited by the Congress prior to the Year one 
thousand eight hundred and eight, but a Tax or duty may be 
imposed on such Importation, not exceeding ten dollars for each 
Person. 

The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be sus- 
pended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public 
Safety may require it. 

21 — 2 



324 Appendix. 

No Bill of Attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed. 

No Capitation, or other direct, Tax shall be laid, unless in Pro- 
poidon to the Census or Enumeration herein before directed to be 
taken. 

No Tax or Duty shall be laid on Articles exported from any 
State. 

No Preference shall be given by any Regulation of Commerce 
or Revenue to the Ports of one State over those of another : nor 
shall Vessels bound to, or from, one State, be obliged to enter, 
clear, or pay Duties in another. 

No Money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Conse- 
quence of Appropriations made by Law ; and a regular Statement 
and Account of the Receipts and Expenditures of all public Money 
shall be published from time to time. 

No Title of Nobility shall be granted by the United States : 
And no Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them, 
shall, without the Consent of the Congress, accept of any present, 
Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, 
Prince, or foreign State. 

Section, id. No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, 
or Confederation ; grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal ; coin 
Money ; emit Bills of Credit ; make any Thing but gold and silver 
Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts ; pass any Bill of Attainder, ex 
post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts, or 
grant any Title of Nobility. 

No State shall, without the Consent of the Congress, lay any 
Imposts or Duties on Imports or Exports, except what may be 
absolutely necessary for executing its inspection Laws : and the 
net Produce of all Duties and Imposts, laid by any State on 
Imports or Exports, shall be for the Use of the Treasury of the 
United States ; and all such Laws shall be subject to the Revision 
and Controul of the Congress. 

No State shall, without the Consent of Congress, lay any Duty 
of Tonnage, keep Troops, or Ships of War in time of Peace, enter 
into any Agreement or Compact with another State, or with a for- 
eign Power, or engage in War, unless actually invaded, or in such 
imminent Danger as will not admit of delay. 



Appendix. 325 

ARTICLE. II. 

Section, i. The executive Power shall be vested in a President 
of the United States of America. He shall hold his Office during 
the Term of four Years, and, together with the Vice President, 
chosen for the same Term, be elected, as follows 

Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature 
thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Num- 
ber of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be 
entitled in the Congress : but no Senator or Representative, or Per- 
son holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United States, 
shall be appointed an Elector. 

The Electors shall meet in their respective States, and vote by 
Ballot for two Persons, of whom one at least shall not be an 
Inhabitant of the same State with themselves. And they shall 
make a List of all the Persons voted for, and of the Number of 
Votes for each ; which List they shall sign and certify, and transmit 
sealed to the Seat of the Government of the United States, directed 
to the President of the Senate. The President of the Senate shall, 
in the Presence of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all 
the Certificates, and the Votes shall then be counted. The Person 
having the greatest Number of Votes shall be the President, if such 
Number be a Majority of the whole Number of Electors appointed ; 
and if there be more than one who have such Majority, and have 
an equal Number of Votes, then the House of Representatives shall 
immediately chuse by Ballot one of them for President ; and if no 
Person have a Majority, then from the five highest on the List the 
said House shall in like Manner chuse the President. But in chus- 
ing the President, the Votes shall be taken by States, the Repre- 
sentation from each State having one Vote ; A quorum for this 
Purpose shall consist of a Member or Members from two thirds of 
the States, and a Majority of all the States shall be necessary to a 
Choice. In every Case, after the Choice of the President, the Per- 
son having the greatest Number of Votes of the Electors shall be 
the Vice President. But if there should remain two or more who 
have equal Votes, the Senate shall chuse from them by Ballot the 
Vice President. 

The Congress may determine the Time of chusing the Electors, 



326 Appendix. 

and the Day on which they shall give their Votes ; which Day shall 
be the same throughout the United States. 

No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the 
United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, 
shall be eligible to the Office of President ; neither shall any 
Person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to 
the Age of thirty-five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident 
within the United States. 

In Case of the Removal of the President from Office, or of his 
Death, Resignation, or Inability to discharge the Powers and Duties 
of the said Office, the Same shall devolve on the Vice President, 
and the Congress may by Law provide for the Case of Removal, 
Death, Resignation, or Inability, both of the President and Vice 
President, declaring what Officer shall then act as President, and 
such Officer shall act accordingly, until the Disability be removed, 
or a President shall be elected. 

The President shall, at stated Times, receive for his Services, 
a Compensation, which shall neither be encreased nor diminished 
during the Period for which he shall have been elected, and he 
shall not receive within that Period any other Emolument from the 
United States, or any of them. 

Before he enter on the Execution of his Office, he shall take the 
following Oath or Affirmation : — 

" I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute 
"the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best 
" of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of 
<ithe United States." 

Section. 2. The President shall be Commander in Chief of 
the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of 
the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United 
States ; he may require the Opinion, in writing, of the principal 
Officer in each of the executive Departments, upon any Subject 
relating to the Duties of their respective Offices, and he shall have 
Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offences against the 
United States, except in Cases of Impeachment. 

He shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of 
the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators 
present concur; and he shall nominate, and by and with the 



Appendix. 327 

Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, 
other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the supreme Court, 
and all other Officers of the United States, whose Appointments 
are not herein otherwise provided for, and which shall be established 
by Law : but the Congress may by Law vest the Appointment of 
such inferior Officers, as they think proper, in the President alone, 
in the Courts of Law, or in the Heads of Departments. 

The President shall have Power to fill up all Vacancies that 
may happen during the Recess of the Senate, by granting Com- 
missions which shall expire at the End of their next Session. 

Section. 3. He shall from time to time give to the Congress 
Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their 
Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and 
expedient ; he may, on extraordinary Occasions, convene both 
Houses, or either of them, and in Case of Disagreement between 
them, with Respect to the Time of Adjournment, he may adjourn 
them to such Time as he shall think proper ; he shall receive Am- 
bassadors and other public Ministers ; he shall take Care that the 
Laws be faithfully executed, and shall Commission all the Officers 
of the United States. 

Section. 4. The President, Vice President and all civil Officers 
of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeach- 
ment for, and Conviction of. Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes 
and Misdemeanors. 

ARTICLE. III. 

Section, i. The judicial Power of the United States, shall 
be vested in one supreme Court, and in such inferior Courts as 
the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish. The 
Judges, both of the supreme and inferior Courts, shall hold their 
Offices during good Behaviour, and shall, at stated Times, receive 
for their Services, a Compensation, which shall not be diminished 
during their Continuance in Office. 

Section. 2. The judicial Power shall extend to all Cases, in 
Law and Equity, arising under this Constitution, the Laws of the 
United States, and Treaties made, or which shall be made, under 
their Authority; — to all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public 
Ministers and Consuls; — to all Cases of admiralty and maritime 



328 Appendix. 

Jurisdiction ; — to Controversies to which the United States shall 
be a Party ; — to Controversies between two or more States ; — be- 
tween a State and Citizens of another State ; — between Citizens 
of different States, — between Citizens of the same State claiming 
Lands under Grants of different States, and between a State, or 
the Citizens thereof, and foreign States, Citizens or Subjects. 

In all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and 
Consuls, and those in which a State shall be Party, the supreme 
Court shall have original Jurisdiction. In all the other Cases 
before mentioned, the supreme Court shall have appellate Juris- 
diction, both as to Law and Fact, with such Exceptions, and under 
such Regulations as the Congress shall make. 

The Trial of all Crimes, except in Cases of Impeachment, shall 
be by Jury ; and such Trial shall be held in the State where the 
said Crimes shall have been committed ; but when not committed 
within any State, the Trial shall be at such Place or Places as the 
Congress may by Law have directed. 

Section. 3. Treason against the United States, shall consist 
only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, 
giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of 
Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same 
overt Act, or on Confession in open Court. 

The Congress shall have Power to declare the Punishment of 
Treason, but no Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of 
Blood, or Forfeiture except during the Life of the Person attainted. 

ARTICLE. IV. 

Section, i. Full Faith and Credit shall be given in each 
State to the public Acts, Records, and judicial Proceedings of every 
other State. And the Congress may by general Laws prescribe 
the Manner in which such Acts, Records and Proceedings shall be 
proved, and the Effect thereof. 

Section. 2. The Citizens of each State shall be entitled to 
all Privileges and Immunities of Citizens in the several States. 

A Person charged in any State with Treason, Felony, or other 
Crime, who shall flee from Justice, and be found in another State, 
shall on Demand of the executive Authority of the State from 



Appendix. 329 

which he fled, be delivered up, to be removed to the State having 
Jurisdiction of the Crime. 

No person held to Service or Labour in one State, under the 
Laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in Consequence of any 
Law or Regulation therein, be discharged from such Service or 
Labour, but shall be delivered up on Claim of the Party to whom 
such Service or Labour may be due. 

Section. 3. New States may be admitted by the Congress 
into this Union ; but no new State shall be formed or erected 
within the Jurisdiction of any other State ; nor any State be 
formed by the Junction of two or more States, or Parts of States, 
without the Consent of the Legislatures of the States concerned 
as well as of the Congress. 

The Congress shall have Power to dispose of and make all 
needful Rules and Regulations respecting the Territory or other 
Property belonging to the United States ; and nothing in this 
Constitution shall be so construed as to Prejudice any Claims of 
the United States, or of any particular State. 

Section. 4. The United States shall guarantee to every State 
in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall pro- 
tect each of them against Invasion ; and on Application of the 
Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be 
convened) against domestic Violence. 

ARTICLE. V. 

The Congress, whenever two thirds of both Houses shall deem 
it necessary, shall propose Amendments to this Constitution, or, 
on the Application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several 
States, shall call a Convention for proposing Amendments, which, 
in either Case, shall be valid to all Intents and Purposes, as Part 
of this Constitution, when ratified by the Legislatures of three 
fourths of the several States, or by Conventions in three fourths 
thereof, as the one or the other Mode of Ratification may be 
proposed by the Congress ; Provided that no Amendment which 
may be made prior to the Year One thousand eight hundred and 
eight shall in any Manner affect the first and fourth Clauses in the 
Ninth Section of the first Article ; and that no State, without its 
Consent, shall be deprived of its equal Suffrage in the Senate. 



330 Appendix. 

ARTICLE. VI. 

All Debts contracted and Engagements entered into, before 
the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be as valid against the 
United States under this Constitution, as under the Confederation. 

This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which 
shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or 
which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, 
shall be the supreme Law of the Land ; and the Judges in every 
State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or 
Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding. 

The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the 
Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and 
judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several 
States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this 
Constitution ; but no religious Test shall ever be required as 
a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United 
States. 

ARTICLE. VII. 

The Ratification of the Conventions of nine States, shall be 
sufficient for the Establishment of this Constitution between the 
States so ratifying the Same. 

Done in Convention by the Unanimous Consent of 

[Note of the draughtsman the States present the Seventeenth Day of September 

as to interlineations in the in the Year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred 

text of the manuscript.] and Eighty seven and of the Independence of the 

^jjggj United States of America the Twelfth 5n 515Eitn£S3 

whereof We have hereunto subscribed our names. 

William Jackson 

Secretary. G^ WASHINGTON- _ 

Presidt and depjity fro7>i V^irginia. 

[The authenticity of the instrument was further attested by the signatures of 
thirty-eight members.] 

THE AMENDMENTS. 

ARTICLES in addition to and Amendment of the Constitution 
of the United States of America, proposed by Congress, and 
ratified by the Legislatures of the several States, pursuant to 
the fifth Article of the original Constitution. ^ 

1 This heading appears only in the joint resolution submitting the first ten 
amendments. 



Appendix. 331 

[ARTICLE I.] 

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of 
religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the 
freedom of speech, or of the press ; or the right of the people 
peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress 
of grievances. 

[ARTICLE II.] 

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a 
free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not 
be infringed. 

[ARTICLE III.] 

No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, 
without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a 
manner to be prescribed by law. 

[ARTICLE IV.] 

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, 
papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, 
shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon 
probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly 
describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to 
be seized. 

[ARTICLE v.] 

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise 
infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand 
Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in 
the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public 
danger ; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be 
twice put in jeopardy of life or limb ; nor shall be compelled in 
any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be de- 
prived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law ; 
nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just 
compensation. 



332 Appendix. 

[ARTICLE VI.] 
In all criminal prosecutions the accused shall enjoy the right to 
a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and 
district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which dis- 
trict shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be 
informed of the nature and cause of the accusation ; to be con- 
fronted with the witnesses against him ; to have compulsory pro- 
cess for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance 
of Counsel for his defence. 

[ARTICLE VII.] 
In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall 
exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, 
and no fact tried by a jury shall be otherwise re-examined in any 
Court of the United States, than according to the rules of the 
common law. 

[ARTICLE VIII.] 
Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, 
nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted . 

[ARTICLE IX.] 
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall 
not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the 
people. 

[ARTICLE X.] 

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Consti- 
tution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States 
respectively or to the people.^ 

[ARTICLE XL] 

The Judicial power of the United States shall not be construed 
to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted 
against one of the United States by Citizens of another State, or by 
Citizens or Subjects of any Foreign State. ^ 

1 Amendments First to Tenth appear to have been in force from Nov. 3, 
1791. 

2 Proclaimed to be in force Jan. 8, 1 798. 



Appendix. 333 



[ARTICLE XIL] 

The Electors shall meet in their respective states, and vote by 
ballot for President and Vice-President, one of whom, at least, 
shall not be an inhabitant of the same state with themselves ; they 
shall name in their ballots the person voted for as President, and 
in distinct ballots the person voted for as Vice-President, and they 
shall make distinct lists of all persons voted for as President, 
and of all persons voted for as Vice-President, and of the nmnber 
of votes for each, which lists they shall sign and certify, and 
transmit sealed to the seat of the government of the United States, 
directed to the President of the Senate ; — The President of the 
Senate shall, in the presence of the Senate and House of Repre- 
sentatives, open all the certificates and the votes shall then be 
counted ; — The person having the greatest number of votes for 
President, shall be the President, if such number be a majority 
of the whole number of Electors appointed ; and if no person have 
such majority, then from the persons having the highest numbers 
not exceeding three on the list of those voted for as President, 
the House of Representatives shall choose immediately, by ballot, 
the President. But in choosing the President, the votes shall 
be taken by states, the representation from each state having 
one vote ; a quorum for this purpose shall consist of a member 
or members from two-thirds of the states, and a majority of all 
the states shall be necessary to a choice. And if the House of 
Representatives shall not choose a President whenever the right 
of choice shall devolve upon them, before the fourth day of March 
next following, then the Vice-President shall act as President, 
as in the case of the death or other constitutional disability of 
the President. — The person having the greatest number of votes 
as Vice-President, shall be the Vice-President, if such number 
be a majority of the whole number of Electors appointed, and 
if no person have a majority, then from the two highest numbers 
on the list, the Senate shall choose the Vice-President ; a quorum 
for the purpose shall consist of two-thirds of the whole number 
of Senators, and a majority of the whole number shall be necessary 
to a choice. But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office 



334 Appendix. 

of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of th2 United 
States.i 

ARTICLE XIII. 

Section i. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except 
as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly 
convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject 
to their jurisdiction. Section 2. Congress shall have power to 
enforce this article by appropriate legislation. ^ 

ARTICLE XIV. 

Section i. All persons born or naturalized in the United 
States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the 
United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State 
shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges 
or immunities of citizens of the United States ; nor shall any State 
deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process 
of law ; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal 
protection of the laws. 

Section 2. Representatives shall be apportioned among the 
several States according to their respective numbers, counting the 
■whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not 
taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice 
of electors for President and Vice-President of the United States, 
Representatives in Congress, the Executive and Judicial officers 
of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied 
to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one 
years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way 
abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, 
the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the pro- 
portion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the 
whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such 
State. 

Section 3. No person shall be a Senator or Representative 
in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold 

1 Proclaimed to be in force Sept. 25, 1804. 

2 Proclaimed to be in force Dec. 18, 1865. Bears the unnecessary 
approval of the President. 



Appendix. 335 

any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under 
any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member 
of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member 
of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of 
any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, 
shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, 
or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress 
may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability. 

Section 4. The validity of the public debt of the United 
States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of 
pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or 
rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States 
nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred 
in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any 
claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave ; but all such debts, 
obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void. 

Section 5 . The Congress shall have power to enforce, by ap- 
propriate legislation, the provisions of this article.^ 

ARTICLE XV. 

Section i. The right of citizens of the United States to 
vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by 
any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servi- 
tude. — 

Section 2. The Congress shall have power to enforce this 
article by appropriate legislation. — ^ 

1 Proclaimed to be in force July 28, 1868. 

2 Proclaimed to be in force Mar. 30, 1870. 



336 Appendix. 



BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE. 

[For more extended bibliographical information reference should 
be made to Winsor's Narrative and Critical History of America 
(8 vols.). This work extends only to 1850 ; Vols. V, VI, VII, and 
VIII cover the period from 1760 — 1850. Less extensive works are 
B. A. Hinsdale's The Study of American History, and Channing 
and Hart's Guide to the Study of American History. '\ 

Comprehensive Works. There is no good comprehensive 
work covering the period under review. Gay's Bryanfs Popular 
History is the best book, but it is not well proportioned. The 
Epochs of American History, edited by Albert Bushnell Hart, 
treat the period from a more constitutional point of view. These 
volumes are well equipped with maps, bibliographies and other 
"helps" to readers. The American History Series, now in course 
of publication, will ultimately form a more or less connected work 
by different hands. The Ajnerican Statesme7i Series, edited by 
John T. Morse, Jr., takes the place to some extent of a more 
formal work. But many of the volumes are tinged with the 
federalist views of the editor and his collaborators. T. W. Higgin- 
son's Larger History of the United States is a readable series of 
essays on the period before 1830. 

Historical Geography. There is no good work on the historical 
geography of America. Winsor, in his America and other works, 
provides an abundant supply of fac-similes of contemporary maps. 
The maps in Hart's Epochs of American History have been gathered 
into a thin volume, without text, entitled : Epoch Maps. They are 
suited to the needs of the ordinary student, but are on a very small 
scale. The American maps in Gardiner's School Atlas are poor 
and untrustworthy. 

The American Revolution. 

General "Works. Frothingham's Rise of the Republic ; Lodge's 
Short History of the English Colonies (contains also a useful 



Appendix. 337 

summary of the colonial institutions) ; Fiske's American Revolu- 
tion ; George Bancroft's United States ; Hildreth's United States ; 
Pitkin's United States; J. C. Hamilton's Republic of the United 
States; the "narrative" portions of Winsor's America (Vols. V, 
VI and VII) ; G. W. Greene's Historical View. Among the more 
extended works, Lecky's England (Vols. Ill and IV) will be found 
most satisfactory. Other British works are Mahon's England, which 
contains an ultra-British view ; the histories of Massey (Whig) 
and Adolphus (Tory) ; Seeley's Expansion of England; Merivale's 
Colonization ; Lewis's Government of Dependencies (contains an 
interesting old-time view) ; May's Constitntional History of 
England; Burke's Fliiropean Settlements in America and his 
speeches on American affairs ; Bernard's Letters on the Trade and 
Government of America. 

Special Works. Gordon's American Revolution ; Graham's 
United States ; Ramsay's Revolution ; Chalmers's Introduction to 
the Revolt; Hutchinson's Massachusetts (Vol. Ill) ; Lossing's 
Field-Book of the Revolution ; Carrington's Battles of the Revo- 
lution; Dawson's Battles of the United States (Vol. I) ; Beatson's 
Naval and Military Memoirs of Great Britain ; Stedman's Ameri- 
can War ; Moore's Diary of the Revolution ; Jones's New York 
in the Revolutiottary War (a Tory view) ; Galloway's Rise and 
Progress of the Rebellion (another Tory account) ; E. J. Lowell's 
The Hessians in the Revolutio7i ; Greene's Gerinan Element ; 
Tyler's American Literature ; Sabine's Loyalists ; Ryerson's 
Loyalists. 

For Otis's speech on the Writs of Assistance, see Ouincy's 
Reports, appendix by Horace Gray ; John Adams's Diary in his 
Works, Vol. II. Henry's speech in the Parson's cause is best 
described in W. W. Henry's Life and Speeches of Patrick Heiiry, 
Vol. I. For other statements of the American theory of the 
constitution of the Empire and for the American theory of govern- 
ment see Otis's The Rights of the Colonies asserted and proved 
(1764); Stephen Hopkins's The Rights of the Colonies examined 
(1765), reprinted at London (1766) as The Grievances of the 
American Colonies candidly examined ; Richard Bland's Enqidry 
in the Rights of the British Colonies (1769) ; Thomas Jefferson's 
A Summary View of the Rights of British America (reprinted by 

C. A. 22 



33^ Appendix. 

Hart and Channing as American History Leaflet, No. ii). The 
authors of these essays continually refer to Locke's Essay on 
Governfnent ; 'Hodke.fs Ecclesiastical Polity ; Harrington's Oceana, 
and Montesquieu's E Esprit des Lois. The Virginia Resolves (1769) 
and the Declaration of Independence (1776) are printed in the 
appendix of the present volume. 

It is impossible in a bibliographical note like the present to 
mention even the more important original sources. For them the 
student should go to Winsor's Hand-Book of the Revolution or 
to one of the bibliographies mentioned at the head of this list. 
The names of a few of the most important collections may be 
given : Force's American Archives ; Niles's Principals and Acts ; 
Journals and Secret Journals of the Continental Congress ; The 
Parliamentary History ; Cavendish's Debates ; Rogers's Protests 
of the Lords ; Almon's Prior Documents ; and Almon's Remem- 
brancer ; Donne, Correspondence between George III and Lord 
North ; The Bedford Papers. 

For the Diplomacy of the Revolution, see Lyman's and Tres- 
cott's works on the Diplomacy of the United States ; Wharton's 
Digest of /nternational Law ; Wharton's and Sparks's editions of 
the Diplomatic Correspondence of the Revolution ; Treaties and 
Conventions between the United States and Other Powers, and 
Davis's " Notes " appended thereto. See also the biographies of 
Franklin, Jay, John Adams, and Silas Deane, noted below. 

The United States, 1783 — 1865. 

Comprehensive Works covering the whole field : Schouler's 
United States (5 vols.) ; Goldwin Smith's United States (a political 
study) ; Stanwood's History of Presidential Elections ; Von Hoist's 
Constitutional History of the United States (8 vols.) ; Wise, Seven 
Decades; Professor Johnston's articles in Lalor's Cyclopcedia of 
Political Science. 

Special Works (arranged chronologically) . 

Fiske's Critical Period (1783 — 1789) ; G. T. Curtis's Constitu- 
tional History (1783 — 1789) ; Hildreth's United States, 2nd Series 
or Vols. IV— VI (1783— 1821) ; McMaster, History of the People 
(1783 — 1821) ; Tucker's United States (a Southern view, stops at 



Appendix. 339 

1840) ; Gibbs's Administrations of Washington and Adams; 
Henry Adams's United States, 9 vols. (1800 — 1817) ; Benton's 
Thirty Vears^ View (1820 — 1850); Rhodes's United States (1850 — 
1 861) ; Taussig's Tariff History. 

Lossing's Field-Book of the War of 181 2; Cooper's Naval 
History ; James's Naval History ; Roosevelt's Naval War of 
1812. 

J. G. Blaine's Twenty Years in Congress (1840 — 1885) ; Jefferson 
Davis's Rise and Fall of the Confederate Govern7nent ; Goodell's 
Slavery and Anti-Slavery ; Greeley's Slavery Extension and 
American Conflict; Olmsted's books on life in the South, espe- 
cially his Cotton Kingdoiii ; Wilson's Rise and Fall of the Slave 
Power; Dodge's Bird's-Eye View of the Civil War; Ropes's 
Story of the Civil War; Scribner's series of Cai7tpaigns of the 
Civil War; Stephens's Constitutional View of the War between 
the States (from a Southern standpoint); Pollard's Lost Cause; 
Eggleston's A RebeVs Recollections; and A Rebel War Clerk's 
Diary. 

Constitutional Treatises. Pomeroy's Introduction ; Cooley's 
General Principles ; Story's and Kent's Comme7itaries ; Von 
Hoist's Cojistitutional Law; Thayer's Cases ott ConstitJitional 
Law. In this connection may be enumerated de Tocqueville's 
Detnocracy z« America ; Bryce's American Commonwealth ; Fiske's 
Civil Governmejit ; Hart's Federal Government ; Jameson's Con- 
stitutional Cojiventions ; and Borgeaud's Constitutions . 

Biographies (covering the whole period, arranged alphabetically 
under Americans and Foreigners) . 

Americans: Adams, John (1735 — 1826) : Works edited with a 
memoir by C. F. Adams. Vol. I contains the "Life " by the editor ; 
Vols. II and III the Diary and Autobiography. See also Fajniliar 
Letters of fohn Adams and his Wife, and a biography by J. T. 
Morse, Jr. Adams, John Quincy (1767 — 1848) : Memoirs con- 
tains his Diary, which is a most important document of its kind. 
Biographies by Josiah Quincy, Seward, and Morse. Adams, 
Samuel (1722 — 1803) : Life and Services by Wm. V. Wells. Also 
a brief biography by Hosmer. Arnold, Benedict (1741 — 1801) : 
by I. N. Arnold. Buchanan, James (1791 — 1868) : by G. T. 
Curtis. Burr, Aaron (1756 — 1836) : by Davis and by Parton. 

22 — 2 



340 Appendix. 

Calhoun, John Caldwell (17S2 — 1850) : Works (6 vols.). Biog- 
raphy by Von Hoist. Cass, Lewis (1782 — 1866): by McLaughlin. 
Chase, Salmon Portland (1808 — 1873) '• by Schucker. Clay, 
Henry (1777 — 1852) : Works (6 vols.). Biographies by Mallory 
and Schurz. Dickinson, John (1732 — 1808) : Life and Letters 
by Stille. Franklin, Benjamin (1706 — 1790) : Works edited by 
Sparks and by Bigelow. Bigelow's Life of Fraiiklin written by 
himself. Biographies by Parton, McMaster, and Morse. Gallatin, 
Albert (1761 — 1849) • ^^f^ '^"^ Writings by Henry Adams. 
Garrison, William Lloyd (1805 — 1879) : by Garrison. Gerry, 
Elbridge (1744 — 1814) : by Austin. Grant, Ulysses Simpson 
(1822 — 1885) : Personal Memoirs. Greene, Nathanael (1742 — 
1786) : by G. W. Greene and Johnson. Hamilton, Alexander 
(1757 — 1804) : Works edited by J. C. Hamilton and by Lodge. 
Biographies by J. C. Hamilton, Morse, Sumner, and Lodge. 
Henry, Patrick (1736 — 1799) : Life and Speeches by Wm. W. 
Henry. Biographies by Wm. Wirt and by M. C. Tyler. Iredell, 
James (1750 — 1799) '• by McRee. Jackson, Andrew (1767 — 
1845) : by Parton and Sumner. Jay, John (1745 — 1829) : by 
Wm. Jay and by Pellew. Jefferson, Thomas (1743 — ^1826) : 
Writings, edited by H. A. Washington. A new edition by Ford 
is in course of publication. Biographies by Randall, Tucker, 
Parton, and Morse. Lincoln, Abraham (1809 — 1865): Speeches 
and Works by Hay and Nicolay. Biography by the same (10 
vols.), also by Herndon. Madison, James (1751 — 1836): Papers. 
Biographies by Rives and by Gay. Mason, George (1725 — 1792) : 
by K. M. Rowland. Monroe, James (1758 — 1831) : by Gilman. 
Morgan, Daniel (1736 — 1802) : by Graham. Morris, Gouver- 
neur (1752 — 1816) : by Sparks and Tuckerman. Morris, Robert 
(1734 — 1806) : Sumner's Financier and Finances of the Revohttio7i. 
Otis, James (1725 — 1783) : by Tudor. Pickering, Timothy 
(1745 — 1829) : by Pickering and Upham. . Randolph, John 
(1773 — 1833) • by H. Adams. Reed, Joseph (1741 — 1785) : by 
Reed. Schuyler, Philip (1733 — 1804) : by Lossing. Seward, 
William Henry (1801 — 1872) : Works edited by Baker. Biogra- 
phies by Lothrop and by F. W. Seward. Sherman, William 
Tecumseh (1820 — 1891) : Memoirs. Sumner, Charles (181 1 — 
1874) : Memoir aitd Letters by Pierce (4 vols.). Van Buren, 



Appendix. 341 

Martin (1782 — 1862) : by Shepard. Washington, George 
(1732 — 1799) : Writings edited by Sparks and by Ford. Biogra- 
phies by John Marshall, Sparks, Irving, and Lodge. Wayne, 
Anthony (1741 — 1796) : by Armstrong. Webster, Daniel 
(1782 — 1852) : Works edited by Everett. Biographies by G. T. 
Curtis and Lodge. 

Biographies of many less important men may be found in bio- 
graphical collections, as Sparks's American Biography. 

Foreigners : Andre, John (1751 — 1780) : Biography by Sargent. 
For the circumstances of his death, see Dawson's Papers concern- 
ing the Capture of Andre and Proceedings of a Board; Arnold's 
Arnold; Lossing's Two Spies; Greene's Greene; Lafayette's Me- 
inoires ; Rush's Washington i7t Dofnestic Life. The question as to 
Andre's status is discussed on both sides in Sir Sherstone Baker's 
edition of Halleck's International Law. The best concise account, 
with complete bibliography, is by Winsor in his America, VL 447 
and foil. Burgoyne, John (1722 — 1792) : by Fonblanque. Burke, 
Edmund (1729 — 1797): f^Fijri'i- (many editions). Biographies by 
Macknight and John Morley. Corn-wallis, Charles, Earl and 
Marquis (1738 — 1805) : Correspondence badly edited by Ross. 
Fox, Charles James (1749 — 1806) : Life and Times and Memo- 
rials of by Earl Russell. See also Trevelyan's Early Days of. 
Grenville, George (1712 — 1770) : The Grenville Papers. Kalb, 
John (1721 — 1780) : by Kapp. Lafayette, Marquis de (1757 — 
1834): Memoires. Biography by Tower and by Tuckerman. Pitt, 
William, Earl of Chatham (1708 — 1788) : Correspondence. Biog- 
raphy by Thackeray. Pitt, William (1759 — 1806) : by Stanhope 
and by Rosebery. Riedesel, Baroness, Memoirs. Rochambeau, 
Marquis de (1725 — 1807) : Memoires. Rockinghaip, Charles 
Watson Wentworth, Marquis of (1730 — 1782) : Memoirs of, by 
Albemarle. Shelburne, William Petty, Earl of, later Marquis 
of Lansdowne (1737 — 1805) : Life of by Fitzmaurice. Steuben, 
Baron (1730 — 1794) : by Kapp. See also Campbell's Lord Chan- 
cellors and Lord Chief fustices. 



INDEX. 



Adams, Henry, on the limits of the 
Louisiana Purchase, 172 

Adams, John, 43, 62; elected to 
Continental Congress, 68; advo- 
cates independence, 86; draws the 
Massachusetts Bill of Rights, ^5; 
Peace Commissioner, 103; Vice- 
President, 133; President, 149; 
defeated by Jefferson, 155; Ad- 
ministration of, 151-159; end of 
his career, 158; death of, 159 

Adams, John Quincy, and the Treaty 
of Ghent, 194; Secretary of 
State, negotiates Florida Treaty, 
199; chosen President, 205; Ad- 
ministration of, 205-207 ; defeated 
by Jackson, 207; Member of 
House of Representatives, de- 
fends the Right of Petition, 236; 
states the effects of war on Slav- 
ery, 261-262 

Adams, Samuel, 36; at the time of 
the Boston Massacre, 62; estab- 
lishes Committees of Correspond- 
ence, 63; elected to the Conti- 
nental Congress, 68 

Albany Plan of Union, 38 

Alexandria Convention, 123 

Alien and Sedition Acts, 152 

Amendments to the Constitution of 
the United States, Appendix V, 
125; the First Ten, 133; the 
Eleventh, 125; the Twelfth, 157; 
the Thirteenth, 278 

American Ideals, 160 

Andre, John, Executed as a spy, 95; 
Authorities on, 341 



Andrew, John A., Opinions of on 
Brown's execution, 253 ; Gov- 
ernor of Massachusetts, prepares 
for the Civil War, 264 
Annapolis Convention, 123 
Antietam, Battle of, 277 
Anti-Federalists, Oppose Ratifica- 
tion of the Constitution, 132 
Anti-Masonic Party, 218 
Anti-Slavery Agitation, 235 
Anti-Slavery Petition presented to 

Congress, 143 
Appeal of the Independent Demo- 
crats, 245 
Appomattox Court House, Surren- 
der of Lee at, 291 
Arnold, Benedict, 75 ; in Canada, 
83; in the Saratoga Campaign, 
92; Treason of, 95; in Virginia, 
100 
Articles of Confederation, 109, Ap- 
pendix III; Importance of, ill; 
Analysis of, 112; Defects of, 112, 
116, 117; Convention summoned 
to amend, 123 
Ashburton Treaty, 226 
Assistance, Writs of, 42, 57 
Assumption of State Debts, 141 
Atlanta Campaign, 285, 286 

Baltimore, Population of, in 180&, 
161; in 1830, 209; in i860, 259 

Bank, First United States, 145; 
Second, chartered, 197; Removal 
of the Deposits from, 220 

Barbe-Marbois, Supposed Letter 
from, 103 



342 



Index. 



343 



Bayonne Decree, i8i 

Beaumarchais, Caron de, 94 

Bennington, Battle of, 91 

Benton, Senator from Missouri, 239 

Berlin Decree, 176 

Bernard, Governor of Massachusetts 
and Otis, 44 

Border States, The, in 1861, 266 

Boston Massacre, 61, 62 

Boston Tea-Party, 65, 66 

Boston Port Act, 66 

Boston, Siege of, 71, 80; Evacuation 
of, 83; Population of, in 1800, 
161; in 1830, 209; in i860, 259 

Bragg, Confederate General Brax- 
ton, in Tennessee, 279; defeated 
at Chattanooga, 284 

Brandywine, Battle of the, 90 

Bright, John, on the Civil War, 270 

Brock, British General, 1S9 

Brooklyn, Population of, 1S60, 259 

Brooks, Preston S., Assault of, on 
Sumner, 248 

Brown, General Jacob, 190 

Brown, John, in Kansas, 249; at 
Harper's Ferry, and death, 253 

Brown, Senator from Mississippi, 
formulates demands of Slave- 
owners, 251 

Buchanan, James, President, in the 
Crisis of 1860-61, 263, 264 

Buell, General, at Shiloh, 273; in 
Tennessee, 279 

Bull Run, First Battle of, 269; Sec- 
ond, 276 

Bunker Hill, Battle of, 81 ; criticism 
on, 76, 77 

Burgoyne, British General, 75 ; in 
the Saratoga Campaign, 91 

Burnside, General, in command of 
Army of the Potomac, 277 

Burr, Aaron, elected Vice-President, 
156; kills Hamilton, 173; Con- 
spiracy, 173, 174; Trial of, 174 

Butler, Senator from South Caro- 
lina, 248, 249 

Calhoun, John Caldwell, 188; and 
Jackson, 199; Vice-President, 



204; and NulHfication, 214-216; 
speech on compromise of 1850, 
239; death of, 242 
California, 236, 237 
Camden, Battle of, 97 
Camden, Charles Pratt, Lord, ad- 
vises repeal of Stamp Act, 55 
C-anada, Invasions of, 83, 189 
Canal building, 21 1 
Canning, George, 188; and the 
Monroe Doctrine, 201; declines 
to negotiate, 206 
Carolinas, Population of, 1 760, 2; 
Claims of, to Western Lands, 
109 
Catholics, The Roman, in the Colo- 
nies, 3, 4, 17 
Cessions, The Land, 1 1 1 
Chancellorsville, Battle of, 281 
Charleston, The tea at, 66; Attack 
on, in 1776, 97; Captured by 
British, 97; Convention a{, i860, 
254; Population of, in 1800, 161 
Chase, Salmon P., 242, 265 
Chase, Samuel, Impeachment of, 167 
Chatham-Grafton Ministry, 56 
Chattanooga, Battle of, 284 
Chesapeake, Outrage on the, 179; 

Capture of the, 193 
Chicago, Population of, in i860, 

259 

Chickamauga, Battle of, 283 

Church of England in the Colonies, 
18-20 

Cincinnati, Population of, in 1830, 
209; in i860, 259 

Circuit Court Judges, 126 

Civil Service, Jefferson and the, 
166; Tenure of Office Act, 204; 
J. Q. Adams and the, 206; Jack- 
sim establishes the Spoils System, 
213 

Civil War, The, Causes of, 258-262; 
Expectations of the Southern 
leaders, 262; Theatre of opera- 
tions, 267, 271; Consideration 
of, 292-298 

Clay, Henry, 188; Treaty of Ghent, 
195; and Jackson, 199; defeated 



344 



Index. 



for the Presidency, 204; secures 
J. Q. Adams's election, 205; and 
the Bank of the United States, 
220; and Tyler, 226; again de- 
feated for the Presidency, 229, 
230; Compromise of 1850, 237- 
241 ; Death, 242 
Clinton, Sir Henry, 75; captures 

Charleston, 97 
Cochrane, British Admiral, 190 
Coinage, The, 120 
Cold Harbor, Battle of, 289 
Colonial governments, 26-35 
Colonial Policy of Great Britain, 

39-41 
Colonies, Prosperity of the, 73 
Commissioners of the Customs at 

Boston, 61 
Committees of Correspondence, 63, 

64, 66 
Compromises, The, of the Consti- 
tution, 130; as to Missouri, 202; 

of 1833, 219; of 1850, 239 
Concord, Battle of, 70 
Confederation, Articles of. See 

Articles. 
Confederation, Government of, in; 

Finances of, 116; Foreign affairs, 

117; Causes of the Downfall of, 

121; Dissolution of, 135 
Congress, The Stamp Act, 53; First 

Continental, 68; Voting in, 107; 

The Second Continental, 82 ; of 

the Confederation, 112; of the 

United States, 127 
Constitution, The, and the Guerri- 

ere, 191 
Constitution of the United States, 

Appendix IV; Formation of, 122- 

131 

Continental Line, The Soldiers of 

the, 115 

Connecticut, Population of, 1760, 
2; 1775, 73; Claims to Western 
Lands, 109 

Cornwallis, Lord, 76; in the South, 
97; fortifies Yorktown, 1 00; in 
Virginia, 99-101 ; Capture of, 
due to French assistance, 80 



Cowpens, Battle of the, 98 
Crawford, William H., 204 
Criminals, Deportation of English, 

15 

Crown, Relations of the, to Colo- 
nists, 28 

Davie, WilHam R., 154 

Davis, Jefferson, Senator from Mis- 
sissippi, 237; Formulates slave- 
owners' demands, 251; President 
of the Confederacy, 295 

Deane, Silas, 94 

Dearborn, Secretary of War, 166 

Declaration of Independence, Ap- 
pendix II; Adoption of the, 85; 
Sir Henry Maine's criticism on, 

87 
Declaratory Act, The, 55 
D'Estaing, French Admiral, 100 
De Grasse and the Capture of Corn- 
wallis, lOI 
Democratic Party, Origin of the, 

213; Disruption of, 254 
Deposits of Public Money with the 

States, 222 
Dickinson, John, 86 
Dodge, Col., on the Civil War, 298 
Domain, The National, 109, 1 13 
Donelson, Capture of Fort, 271 
Douglas, Stephen A., and the 
Kansas-Nebraska Bill, 243-246; 
Debate with Lincoln, 250; De- 
clares for the Union, 266 
Dred Scott Decision, 251 
Dutch Immigration, 3 
Dwight, President of Yale College, 
on the Jeffersonian Republicans, 
166 

East Florida, Jackson's Invasion of, 

199 
Education in the Colonies, 22-24 
Elections, Presidential, of 1788, 133; 
of 1792, 147; of 1796, 149; of 
1800, 155; of 1824, 204; of 1828, 
207; of 1840,225; of 1844,229; 
of 1852, 242; of i860, 254; of 
1864, 291 



Index. 



345 



Ellsworth, Oliver, Chief Justice of 
the United States, 154; Com- 
missioner to France, 154; Re- 
signs, 158 

Emancipation Proclamation, 277 

Embargo, The, 180-183 

"Era of Good Feeling," 197 

Ericsson, John, 275 

Erie Canal, 211 

Erskine, British Minister, 184 

Essex, Case of the, 175 

Excise, The, 144 

Farragut, Admiral, takes New Or- 
leans, 272 

Federal Convention, Summoned, 
123; Powers of, 131 ; Members 
of, 124; Madison's Notes of De- 
bates of, 125 

Federal Courts, 126, 139 

Federalists, The, favour adoption 
of Constitution, 132 

Federalist Party, Cause of Defeat 
of, 160 

Fillmore, INIillard, President, 240 ; 
Defeated for re-nomination, 242 

Florida Treaty, 200 

Feeder alist. The, 132 

Fox, Charles James, Dislikes Shel- 
burne, 102 

France, Relations of United States 
with, in 1776-78, 94; in 1794- 
1800, 151-155; in 1806-10,176- 
185; in 1829-35, 221 

Franklin, Benjamin, 21 ; Albany 
Plan of Union, 39; on the Stamp 
Act, 54; in Continental Congress, 
86; in France, 94; Commissioner 
to negotiate Treaty of 1783, 102; 
in Federal Convention, 124; Pres- 
ident of Abolition Society, 143 

Fredericksburg, Battle of, 277 

Freeman's Farm, Battle of, 93 

Free-Willers, 16 

French Alliance, The, 94; Results 
of, 100 

French Revolution, Influence of, on 
American Politics, 147 

French spoliation claims, 155 



Fugitive Slave Act, 241 

Gage, General, his policy, 1774-75, 
69, 76; at Bunker Hill, 81 

Gallatin, Albert, 5; opposes Alien 
Act, 153; Secretary of the Treas- 
ury, 166; and the Smiths, 186; 
on^ of the negotiators of the 
Treaty of Ghent, 194; Minister 
to England, 206 

Garrison, William Lloyd, 235, 236, 
256 

Gaspee, Destruction of the, 64 

Gaspee Commission of Inquiry, 64 

Gates, General Horatio, 75 ; at Sara- 
toga, 93; at Camden, 97 

Genet, French Minister, 147 

Georgia, Population of, 3; claims 
to Western Lands, 109 

George III, and the Tea Duty, 60 

Germaine, Lord George, 76 

German Immigrants, 2, 3 

Germantown, Battle of, 91 

Gerry, Elbridge, Commissioner to 
France, 151 ; on Nationality, 259 

Gerrymander, The, 186 

Gettysburg, Battle of, 282 

Ghent, Treaty of, 194 

Gladstone, W. E., on the Civil War, 
270; on the Constitution, 125 

Goodrich, Removal of, 166 

Governments, Colonial, 26-34 

Grant, Ulysses S., Early career, 267; 
captures Forts Henry and Donel- 
son, 271 ; at Shiloh, 273; captures 
Vicksburg, 280; at Chattanooga, 
284; in command of all the Union 
armies, 285; in the Wilderness 
Campaign, 289; captures Lee's 
Army, 292 

Great Britain, Treaty of 1783 with, 
104; Relations with, 1783-89, 
117, 118; Jay's Treaty with, 148; 
Relations with, 1 783-1 804, 174; 
1806-1812, i77-i8'i, 184-188; 
War of 1812, 188-196; Treaties 
of 1815 and 1818 with, 198; 
1829-36, 206, 221; Ashburton 
Treaty, 226; Oregon Treaty, 232- 



346 



Index. 



234; attitude during the Civil 

War, 269 
Greene, General Nathanael, 74; 

Presides at Andre Trial, 96; in 

the South, 98 
Grenville, George, 35; and the 

Stamp Act, 48, 55 
Guerj'ih'e and Constitution, 191 
Guadalupe Hidalgo, Treaty of, 231 
Guilford Court House, Battle of, 99 

Halifax Plan of Union, 39 

Halleck, General, 273; his Inter- 
national Laiu, 96 

Hamilton, Alexander, Principal au- 
thor of the Fcederalist, 132; 
Intrigues against John Adams, 
133, 150, 155; Secretary of the 
Treasury, 137; Political Opinions, 
137, 138; Restores credit, 140- 
143; the Bank of the United 
States, 145; Opposed to French 
ideas, 147; in command of the 
Army, 152; Letter to Dayton, 
154; Death, 173 

Hancock, John, 36 

Harrison, William Henry, at Tippe- 
canoe, 188; Elected President, 
225; Death, 225 

Hartford Convention, 195 

Hayne on Nullification, 215 

Helper's Impending Crisis, 252 

Henry, Patrick, The Parson's Cause, 
46; Resolutions condemning the 
Stamp Act, 50 ; Committees of 
Correspondence, 64; a National- 
ist, 107; Opposes ratification 
of Constitution, 132; appointed 
Commissioner to France, 154 

Hessians, 87 

Hood, Confederate General, 286, 
288 

Hooker, General Joseph, in com- 
mand of Army of Potomac, 277; 
at Chancellorsville, 281 ; Lookout 
Mountain, 284 

Hooker, Richard, his Ecclesiastical 
Polity, Influence of, 87 

Hopkins, Stephen, 64 



Houston, Samuel, 229 

Howe, British General, 75, 76; at 
Bunker Hill, 81 ; in Campaign of 
1776, 89 

Huguenots in the Colonies, 2, 3 

Hutchinson, Thomas, Writs of As- 
sistance, 42; the Boston Mas- 
sacre, 62; reopens the contest, 63 

Impeachment of Justices of the 

Supreme Court, 126 
Impressment controversy, 178 
Independence, Declaration of, 86; 

Appendix II; Growth of the idea 

of, 83 
Indented Servants, 15 
Inter-colonial communication, 24 
Inter-state conflicts, 1783-88, 121 

Jackson, Andrew, defends New 
Orleans, 191; Invades Florida, 
199; Defeated for the Presi- 
dency, 205; Elected President, 
207, 208; and NuUification, 216- 
219; Re-elected President, 218; 
Removal of the Deposits, 220; 
Censured by the Senate, 221; 
The Specie Circular, 223; and 
the Annexation of Texas, 229 

Jackson, British Minister to the 
United States, 184 

Jackson, Confederate General, in the 
Shenandoah Valley, 274; killed 
at Chancellorsville, 282; as a 
soldier, 297 

Jay, John, one of the negotiators of 
the Treaty of 1783, 103; writes 
part of the Federalist, 132; Chief 
Justice, 136; Negotiates Treaty of 
1794, 148 

Jefferson, Thomas, his Summary 
View, 27, 67; Committees of 
Correspondence, 64; in Second 
Continental Congress, 82; the 
Virginia Constitution, 85 ; Writes 
Declaration of Independence, 86; 
Report on a Monetary System, 
120; and Alexandria Convention, 
123; Minister to France, 136; 



Index. 



347 



Secretary of State and political 
opinions, 136, 138; Aids Hamil- 
ton, 143; Opposes the establish- 
ment of the Bank, 145; as a 
Party Leader, 146; Sympathy 
with the French, 147; and the 
Kentucky Resolutions, 153; 
Elected President, 156; Favours 
Emancipation of the Slaves, 163; 
Administrations of, 165-183; 
Inaugural Address, 165; and the 
Civil Service, 166-16S; and the 
Louisiana Purchase, 169-172; his 
Embargo Policy, 180-182 

Jews, in the Colonies, 2, 4 

Johnston, Albert S., Confederate 
General, 273, 298 

Johnston, J. E., Confederate Gen- 
eral, 274, 298; in Vicksburg 
Campaign, 281 ; opposes Sher- 
man, 285-288 

Judiciary Act of 1801, 157 

Justices of the Supreme Court, 126 

Kansas, The Struggle for, 247-250 
Kansas-Nebraska Bill, 243-246 
Kentucky, Settlers in, 118; a Slave 

State, 144 
Kentucky Resolutions, The, 153 
King's Mountain, Battle of, 98 
Know -Nothing Party, 247 

Lafayette, Marquis de, 75; in Vir- 
ginia, 100 
Land Claims and Cessions, 109-111 
Land System, 16 
Lawrence, Abbot, 247 
Lecompton Convention, 249 
Lee, Charles, 75; at Monmouth, 

95 

Lee, Richard Henry, moves Reso- 
lution for Independence, 85 ; 
Opposes Ratification of the Con- 
stitution, 132 

Lee, R. E., Confederate General, 
276; at Chancellorsville, 281, 282; 
the Wilderness Campaign, 2S9; 
Surrenders, 292; as a soldier, 
297 



Legal Profession, Rise of the, 21 

Le op a 7- d 2inA Chesapeake, 179 

Lexington, Skirmish at, 70 

Liberty, Seizure of the Sloop, 61 

Lincoln, Levi, Attorney-General, 
166 

Lincoln, Abraham, attacks Kansas- 
Nebraska Act, 246; Debate with 
Douglas, 250; on John Brown's 
Raid, 253; Elected President, 
256; his Position in 1861, 261- 
265; First Inaugural Address, 
264; Emancipation Proclamation, 
277; Re-elected President, 291 ; 
Murdered, 292 

Little Belt, The, and the President^ 
187 

Liverpool, Lord, on the Americans, 
189 

Livingston, Minister to France, ne- 
gotiates Louisiana Treaty, 171 

Local government in the Colonies, 
37.38 

Locke, John, Influence of his Essay 
on Government, 45, 87 

Lodge, H. C, on the composition 
of the population, i; on Webster's 
Theory of Nationality, 259 

Longfellow, H. W., on Brown's 
Execution, 253 

Louisiana Purchase, The, 169-172 

Loyalists, The, 92, 97; Treaty of 
1783, as to, 104, 117 

Lundy's Lane, Battle of, 190 

Lyon, General, 267 

McClellan, General G. B., 269; in 
the Peninsular Campaign, 274- 
276; at Antietam, 277; Defeated 
for the Presidency, 291 

McDonough, Commodore, 190 

McDowell, General, 269 

Macon's Bill, No. 2, 185 

Madison, James, and the Alexandria 
Convention, 123; "Notes of the 
Debates " of the Federal Con- 
vention, 125; one of the authors 
of the Fa:deralist, 132; in House 
of Representatives, 136-141; and 



348 



Index. 



a National Bank, 146; author of 
the Virginia Resolutions, 153; 
Secretary of State, 166; Adminis- 
trations of, 184-197 

Maine, Sir Henry, on American 
Political Ideas, 87 

Manufacturing, Restrictions on Co- 
lonial, 32 

Marbois, Barbe-, Letter from, 103 

"March to the Sea," The, 287, 
288 

Marshall, John, Commissioner to 
France, 151; Secretary of State, 
154; Chief Justice, 158, 167, 

174 
Maryland, Roman Catholics in, 17; 
Education in, 23; and the Articles 
of Confederation, ill; and Vir- 
ginia, 122 
Mason and Dixon's Line, 4, 162 
Mason, George, 59; and the Vir- 
ginia Bill of Rights, 84 
Massachusetts, Population of, 1760, 
2; in 1775, 36; in 1810, 195; 
Government of, 36; Circular 
Letter, The, 58; Charter of, sus- 
pended, 66; Provincial Congress, 
69; Claim to Western Lands, 
109; and the War of 1812, 195 
Massacre, The Boston, 61 
Meade, General G. G., 282 
Medical Profession, Rise of the, 21 
Mexican War, The, 230-232 
Middle States, Population of, in 

1800, 162 
Midnight Appointments, The, 158 
Milan Decree, 177 
Mill Spring, Battle of, 271 
Mississippi, Navigation of the, 1 18 
Missouri Compromises, The, 202, 
228, 230, 235; Repeal of, 244; 
Constitutionality of, 251 
Monitor and Merrimac, 274 
Monmouth, Battle of, 95 
Monroe, James, Minister to France, 
151 : and the Louisiana Treaty, 
171; Secretary of State, 186; 
Administrations of, 197-204 
Monroe Doctrine, The, 200 



Montesquieu, Influence of, on Amer- 
ica, 87 

Montgomery, General, 83 

Morgan, General Daniel, 77; in the 
Saratoga Campaign, 93; at the 
Covv^pens, 98 

Morris, Gouverneur, Plan for a 
Monetary System, 1 20; in the 
Constitutional Convention, 125 

Murfreesboro', Battle of, 279 

Napoleon, and the Treaty of 1800, 
155; and Louisiana, 170, 1 71; 
and the Neutrals, 176-185 
National Capital, Controversy as to 

site of, 142 
National Debt, in 1783, 116; in 
1789, 140; Hamilton's Policy, 
141 ; in 1800, 168; Jefferson and 
Gallatin's Policy, 168; Paid off 
in 1835, 222 
National Domain, Origin of the, 
109; Administration of the, 113 
Naturalization, before 1775, 20 
Navigation Acts, 31 ; Evasions of 
the, 41 ; Enforcement of the, 48 
Navy, Jefferson's jealousy of the, 

168 
Neutrality, Proclamation of 1794, 

147 
Newburg Addresses, 116 
New England, Population of, in 
1760, I; in 1800, 162; Education 
in, 23; Town system of, 37; Di- 
minished Importance in 1830, 
211 
New Hampshire, First Constitution 

of, 84 

New Jersey, Education iri, 23; and 

New York, 121; Slavery in, 163 

New Orleans, Battle of, 1815, 191; 

Population of, in 1830, 209; in 

i860, 258; Captured, 1862, 272 

New York, Colony and State of, 

Population, 1760, 3; Roman 

Catholics in, 17; Education in, 

23 ; Claims to Western Lands, 

no; and New Jersey, 121 

New York, City of. Population in 



Index. 



349 



1800,161; in 1830,209; in i860, 

259 
Non-Importation Agreements, 59 
Non-Importation Act of 1804, 175 
North, Lord, Opposes Repeal of Tea 

Duty, 60; Conciliatory Proposals 

of, 95 
North Carolina, Education in, 24; 

Cedes Western Lands, 144 
North, The, Condition of, i860, 259 
Nullification, Theory of, 153; Epi- 
sode, 214, 217-219 

Ohio Valley, Settlements in, 1800, 
163 

Olive Branch Petition, 82 

Orders in Council, 1807, 177 

Ordinance of 1784, 113; of 1787, 
113-115 

Oregon Treaty, 232-234 

Oriskany, Battle of, 92 

Otis, James, and Writs of Assist- 
ance, 42; Political Essays, 43-45; 
and the Stamp Act Congress, 52 

Paine, Thomas, his Common Sense, 

85 
Pakenham, British General, 191 
Panama Congress, 206 
Paper Money, 1784-87, 119 
Parliament of Great Britain and the 

Colonies, 28, 33 
Particularism, Growth of, 107 
Pemberton, Confederate General, 

280, 281 
Peninsular Campaign, 274-276 
Pennsylvania, Population of, in 

1760, 3; in 1775, 73; in 1800, 

162; Roman Catholics in, 17; 

Education in, 23 
Perry, Commodore, 189 
Perryville, Battle of, 279 
Philadelphia, Tea at, 66; Captured 

by British, 90; Population in 

1800, 161; in 1830,209; in i860, 

259 
Phillips, Wendell, 236, 256 
Pickett, Confederate General, 283 
Pierce, Franklin, President, 243 



Pinckney, General, Commissioner to 

P'rance, 151 
Pitt, William, Earl of Chatham, and 

the Stamp Act, 55 ; Ministry of, 

Pitt, William, Enforces " Rule of 
War of 1756," 175 

Plans of Union, 38 

Political Ideas, American, 43-46 

Political Parties, 1787-88, 132; For- 
mation of, 1790-92, 146, 149 

Polk, J. K., President, 229, 230; 
Administration of, 230-234 

Polly, The, Case of, 174 

Pontiac, Conspiracy of, 47 

Pope, General, 271, 273; in Vir- 
ginia, 276 

Population of United States, Statis- 
tics and Distribution of, in 1760, 
1-4; in 1775, 72; in 1800, 161 ; 
in 1830, 208; in 1840, 209; in 
i860, 263 

Post Office, The Colonial, 25 

Potomac, Navigation of the, 123 

Prescott, Colonel, 73, 81 

President of the United States, 
Tenure of Office, 127; Powers 
of, 129; Mode of Election of, 
I33> 157; Salary of, 139; Title 
of, 140 

President, The, and Little Belt, 187 

Prevost, British General, 190 

Princeton, Battle of, 90 

Privateers, American, in Revolu- 
tionary War, 106; in War of 1812, 

193 
Privy Council and the Colonies, 33, 

35 
Proclamation of 1763, 27, 104, no 
Protestant Dissenters in the Colo- 
nies, 18 
Province, a Royal, Government of, 
34 

Quebec Act, 66 

Railways, 212 
Rambouillet Decree, 181 
Rawdon, Lord, 97 



350 



Index. 



Redemptioners, 1 5 
Religion, in the Colonies, 16 
Representative Government, 29 
Representatives, Members of the 
House of. Tenure of Office, 127; 
Salary of, 140 
Republican Party, formed by Jeffer- 
son, 149; The later, 255; Posi- 
tion of, as to Slavery, 256 
Revolution, Causes of, 29-31 
Revolutionary Governments, 84 
Revolutionary War, Theatre of, 77; 
British Strategy in, 76, 78; Char- 
acter of, 79; French Aid, 79; 
Campaigns of, 89-102; Effects of, 

105 

Rhodes, James Ford, on the Kansas- 
Nebraska Act, 245; on Helper's 
Book, 252 

Rhode Island, Population, 2; Ro- 
man Catholics in, 17; Education 
in, 23; Government of, 35, 84; 
Paper Money in, 119 

Riedesel, Baroness, \itx Journal, 89 

Right of Deposit, 171 

Rittenhouse, David, 21 

Rochambeau, Marquis de, 100 

Rockingham Ministries, The First, 
54; The Second, 102 

Rodney, Admiral, on Clinton, 76; 
does not follow De Grasse, loi 

Roman Catholics in the Colonies, 

17 

Rosecrans, General, 279, 283 
Ross, British General, 190 
Russia and the War of 1812, 194 

St. Leger's Campaign, 92 

St. Louis, Population in i860, 259 

Salaries of the principal Federal 

Officers, 139, 140 
Saratoga, Convention of, 93 
Scotch-Irish Immigrants, 2 
Scots, in the Colonies, 2, 3 
Scott, Sir William, 174, 175 
Scott, General Winfield, in War of 

181 2, 190; in Mexican War, 231 ; 

Defeated for the Presidency, 243 
Sedition Act, 152 



Senators, United States, 127, 140 

Servants in the Colonies, 15 

Seward, William H., 219, 237; on 
the Compromise of 1850, 240, 
242; on Kansas-Nebraska Act, 
244; on Slavery, 251; Secretary 
of State, 265; and the Trent 
Case, 270 

Shannon, The, captures the Chesa- 
peake, 193 

Shays's Rebellion, 122 

Shelburne,.in the Second Rocking- 
ham Ministry, 102; begins Nego- 
tiations for Peace, 102; Prime 
Minister, 102 

Sheridan, General, at Murfreesboro', 
279; at Chattanooga, 284; in the 
Shenandoah Valley, 290; in the 
last Campaign, 291 

Sherman, General, in the Vicksburg 
Campaign, 280, 281 ; at Chatta- 
nooga, 284; in the Atlanta Cam- 
paign, 285, 286; the "March to 
the Sea," 287, 288 

Shiloh, Battle of, 272 

Shirley, Governor of Massachusetts, 
42 

Slaves, in the Colonies, 12-14, 72j 
73; in 1800, 162; in 1830, 209; 
in i860, 263; Number of Slave- 
holders in i860, 263; Emancipa- 
tion of, in the North, 113, 114, 
163; First Debates in Congress 
as to, 143, 144; Extension of Slave 
Territory, 228 and foil.; Emanci- 
pation of, in the United States, 
277, 278 

Smith, Goldwin, on the Civil War, 
270 

Smith, Robert, in Madison's Cabi- 
net, 186 

South, The, Population in 1800, 
162; Condition of, in i860, 258 

South Carolina, Population of, in 
1775' 73! Education in, 24; 
Local Government in, 38; Nulli- 
fication in, 217; Secession of, 
256 

Spain, Relations with, 1783-89, 



Index. 



351 



118; cedes Louisiana to France, 
170; withdraws Right of Deposit, 
171 ; cedes Florida, 199, 200 
Specie Circular, The, 223 
Spoils system, 1 66-1 68, 204, 213 
Spottsylvania, Battle of, 289 
" Squatter Sovereignty," 245 
Stamp Act, Reasons for, 47, 49; in 
the Colonies, 50-54; Repealed, 

55 
Stamp Act Congress, 52, 53 
Stanton, Secretary of War, 265 
State Constitutions, Early, 84, 108 
"States-Rights," 214 
Steamboats, 212 
Stephen, Sir James, 175 
Steuben, Baron, 75 
Stone River, Battle of, 279 
Stony Point, Assault on, 95 
Stowe, Mrs., Uncle Toni's Cabin, 

242 
Sumner, Charles, on Fugitive Slave 
Act, 241 ; Senator from Massa- 
chusetts, 242; on the Kansas- 
Nebraska Act, 244; The Crime 
against Kansas, 248; Assault on, 
248 
Sumter, Fort, Attack on, 265 
Supreme Court of the United States, 
126, 127, 139 

Talleyrand and the "X Y Z Affair," 
151 ; and Louisiana, 170 

Taney, Roger B., Secretary of the 
Treasury, removes Deposits, 220; 
gives the Decision in the Dred 
Scott Case, 251 • 

Tariff Acts, of 1 790, 1 39 ; of Abom- 
inations, 213; of 1833, 219; of 
1842, 226 

Tarleton, British General, 77, 97; 
at the Covi'pens, 98 

Taylor, Zachary, in the Mexican 
War, 230, 231; President, 237; 
Death, 240 

Tea Duty, 65 

Tecumseh, 187 

Tennessee, Settlers in, 118 

Territorial Acquisitions, The Louisi- 



ana Purchase, 169; Florida, 199; 
Texas, 229; Mexican Cessions, 
232; Oregon, 232-234 

Texas, 229 

Thomas, General G. H., at Battle 
of Mill Spring, 271 ; at Murfrees- 
boro', 279; at Chickamauga, 283; 
at Chattanooga, 284; wins Battle 
of Nashville, 287 

Tippecanoe, Battle of, 187 

Townshend Acts, 56 

Treaties, Alliance with France, 94; 
of Paris, 104; Jay's Treaty, 148; 
of 1800 with France, 155; Louisi- 
ana Purchase, 171 ; of Ghent, 
194; of 1 81 8 with Great Britain, 
198; Ashburton Treaty, 226; of 
Guadalupe Hidalgo, 231 ; Oregon, 
232 

Trent Case, The, 269 

Trenton, Battle of, 90 

Trevett vs. Weeden, Case of, 119 

Tripolitan War, 169 

Turner, Nat, Insurrection, 236 

Tyler, John, Vice-President, 225; 
President, 226; Administration 
of, 226-230 

Union, Form of, under Articles of 
Confederation, in; Plans of, 38 

Union States, Population of the, 
263 

United States, Boundaries of, in 
1783, 104; Disputes as to, 118, 
198, 199, 226, 229, 233; Stability 
of Government of, under the Con- 
stitution, 127, 128; Area of, 1783 
and 1800, i6i ; in 1830, 209. See 
also Population 

Valley Forge, 91 

Van Buren, Martin, 207; Secretary 
of State, 221; Vice-President, 
218; President, 223; Adminis- 
tration of, 223-225; Defeated for 
re-election, 225 ; Declines over- 
tures of Texas, 229 

Vans Murray, Commissioner to 
France, 154 



352 



Index. 



Veto Power, Exercised by King of 

Great Britain, 2,7, 
Vicksburg Campaign, 280, 281 
Virginia, Population of, in 1760, i, 
2; in 1775, 72; in 1800, 162; 
Social Conditions in, lO; Religion 
in, 17, 18; Education in, 23; 
Local Government in, 38; First 
Constitution of, 84; Topography 
of, 77, 267; Loss of Prestige of, 
210; Claims to Western Lands, 
109, iio; in the War of 1812, 

19s 
Virginia Resolves of 1769, 59 and 

Appendix I 
Virginia Resolutions of 1798, 153 
Virtual Representation, 30 
Volunteers, The Northern, 266 

Wade, B. F., 242 

Walpole, Sir Robert, and the Colo- 
nies, 40 

War of 1812, 188-196 

Washington City, Burning of, 190 

Washington, George, 59, 73, 74; 
Commander-in-Chief, 82 ; and 
Independence, 83; Campaign of 



1776,89; at Trenton and Prince- 
ton, 90; Campaign of 1777, 90; 
at Monmouth, 95 ; at Yorktown, 
100; The Newburgh Addresses, 
115; in the Federal Convention, 
124; President, 134; Adminis- 
trations of, 1 35- 1 50; Farewell 
Address, 150; Appointed Gen- 
eral, 1798, 152; Favours Eman- 
cipation of Slaves, 163 

Wasp and Frolic, 192 

Wayne, General Anthony, 74; at 
Stony Point, 95 

Webster, Daniel, and Hayne, 215; 
Secretary of State, negotiates 
Ashburton Treaty, 226; "Sev- 
enth of March Speech," 240; 
Death, 242 

West Florida, Seizure of, 185 

Wilderness Campaign, 289-290 

Wilmot Proviso, 238, 240 

Writs of Assistance, 42, 57 

Yorktown, Capture of, 100; Respon- 
sibility for British Disaster, 76 

"XYZ Affair," 151 



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